Review by Eric Hillis
Directed by: Mercedes Bryce Morgan
Starring: Marco Pigossi, Maddie Hasson, Alex Roe, Andra Nechita, Eliane Reis, Clayton Spencer
If recent horror movies have taught us one thing it's that if you find that another party has double booked your rental property, turn around immediately and get the hell out of there. Do not under any circumstances agree to share the property, no matter how friendly the strangers appear to be.
The double-booking conceit is quickly becoming a new horror cliché, but director Mercedes Bryce Morgan suggests there's still some juice to be squeezed from this setup with her splatstick erotic thriller Bone Lake.
After an arresting prologue in which a naked couple are crossbowed to death by an unseen assailant while fleeing through some woods (sensitive male viewers may wish to cover their eyes), the familiar setup kicks in. Sage (Maddie Hasson, an American Florence Pugh) and Diego (Marco Pigossi) arrive at the improbably sprawling rental home in the woods they've booked for the weekend to celebrate Sage's new job as an editor. The relationship clearly isn't in great shape - Sage is unsatisfied with the stuffy Diego's limited bedroom skills, and she's sick of financially supporting his failed attempt to write a novel - but Diego naively plans to propose to Sage with his grandmother's ring.
A spanner is thrown in the works when another couple arrives. Will (Alex Roe, a British Dave Franco) and Cin (Andra Nechita) insist have also booked the house. After failed attempts to contact the property owner, the two couples decide the house is big enough to accommodate all four of them. Big mistake.
Joshua Friedlander's script treads a similar narrative trail to the Danish thriller Speak No Evil and its English language remake, with the extroverted Will and Cin plucking at the strings of the uptight Sage and Diego. It begins with mild flirting, escalates to Will and Cin ensuring they "accidentally" expose their impressive bodies to Sage and Diego, and ramps up further to increasingly sinister behaviour.
The question of why Sage and Diego don't simply up and leave is answered by Will and Cin appealing to Diego's fragile ego. Cin claims to work in the publishing industry and promises to get Diego's writing in front of the right people. Like the villainous couples of the Speak No Evil movies, Will and Cin delight in seeing just how far they can exploit Diego by dangling this carrot, and it leads to one of the year's most uncomfortable scenes when Diego's grandmother's ring makes an unexpected appearance.
Morgan's previous horror movie, Spoonful of Sugar, suffered heavily from its insistence on concealing its key details for a reveal that came so late the closing credits played over it. Working with Friedlander here, she avoids making that mistake by making it clear early on that Sage and Diego are in much more danger than they realise. The tension mounts to a skin-crawling degree before a cathartic release of extreme violence in the climax.
Morgan's direction is energetic without being overly showy or distracting, and her use of jump cuts and woozy camera moves hint at how a '90s erotic thriller might have looked if it had been made by Sam Raimi. Nick Matthews' cinematography and the film's production design add to the seedy atmosphere, all pulsating purples and ripe apple reds. Roe and Nechita are devilishly watchable as the manipulative and seductive Will and Cin, while Hasson and Pigossi are suitably awkward as the rabbits caught in their headlights. Bone Lake's premise may not be the most original, but it's executed with aplomb, as ultimately are some of its characters.
Bone Lake is on UK/ROI VOD from November 24th.
