Lavender

In 1985 ... the mother is killed, one of the daughters survives. Not much later the police arrives. Who called them?

What a strange little movie we have in the under-the-radar Canadian supernatural drama "Lavender". It may be a low budget indy, but the story, acting and cinematography are all of high caliber.

Australian beauty Abbie Cornish is Jane, a woman with a horrific past that she can not remember. Cornish resonates as a wife and mother struggling to recall unthinkable events from a tragic childhood. Although she plays a gal from the American Midwest, her indigenous Aussie accent does seep through on occasion. But that doesn't detract from a solid performance as the anchor of a uniformly fine cast which includes veteran pros Dermot Mulroney and Justin Long.

And one other thing. Watching "Lavender" may well result in you never again looking at unexpected presents wrapped in pretty red ribbon as a welcome surprise.

Lavender has the potential to be an interesting, intriguing ghost story, but it never quite hits the mark. Entirely too predictable, if you cannot guess who the villain is you're either not paying attention (who could blame you?) or you've been sheltered from the last 60+ years of thriller/horror stories. To suggest it is Hitchcockesqe is an insult to Alfred, for he would have certainly done more with the script. Overall, the movie is adequate at best but, it is far from the worst and worth watching if you haven't anything better to do. If you are taking off work for an actual sick day, this film is worth watching if for no other reason than it will lull you to sleep.

The movie begins by letting us know that the main character's family was killed when she was young, and that she was found in the house, crouched in the corner holding a pocket razor. Basically the movie then serves to unfold the mystery of what happened all those years ago.

The movie is incredibly slow. I found myself doing that "come on, wrap it up" gesture at the screen on more than one occasion where the camera was just pointed at Abbie Cornish's face, while she stood there looking sad or scared for WAY TOO LONG. I don't require a superhero movie to stay engaged, but the pace on this thing was like watching hair grow.

Like some other reviewers, I also questioned the "look" of Abbie Cornish's character. She certainly didn't look like a photographer. She looked like she was going to a barn dance, every day. I usually don't feel that annoyed by a character's wardrobe, but in this case that darn denim jacket got SO old it was distracting.

That aside, the plot unfolds in a pretty silly way. There isn't much consistency to the supernatural aspects (I am fine suspending disbelief for supernatural stuff -- but please establish some rules instead of having everyone do totally random things!).

By far the SILLIEST thing about this movie, though, is when we get to find out "what really happened." It was 1985 when this multiple murder took place, and the police couldn't put together what happened?? Once you see everything play out on the screen, it's obvious that even a random person off the street examining the bodies could give a fairly good guess. The specific types of injuries (or lack thereof) would make everything pretty obvious.

In short, it isn't a mysterious crime at all, so the police would ABSOLUTELY have figured it out and narrowed in on the killer quite easily. I hate having to suspend THAT much disbelief, so I felt cheated at the end, rather than rewarded for my patience sitting through all of those long, slow scenes.

It's not the worst movie I've ever seen, but there are a LOT of other good things I'd recommend putting ahead of this on your watchlist.

I'm honestly surprised this movie has such a low rating. It's not the best I have ever seen, but it's pretty good. There is a plot twist that I didn't see coming and the main actress played her character really well.

I would recommend this if you like psychological movies that has the climax towards the end.