The Lodge review – chilly horror squanders its potential

There’s a special place in hell reserved for horror films that start out with such promise, only to botch the landing. The Lodge, from Goodnight Mommy directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, is one such film. It has a first act to match any great horror movie in recent memory, before – slowly, depressingly – succumbing to the kind of meaningless chaos characteristic of far less talented filmmakers.

Aiden (Jaeden Lieberher) and Mia (Lia McHugh) are two normal siblings whose parents, Richard (Richard Armitage) and Laura (Alicia Silverstone), are filing for divorce. He’s eager to get it done, on account of Grace (Riley Keough), a younger woman he plans to marry who also happens to be the lone survivor of a doomsday cult. Richard is eager for his kids to bond with Grace, so he suggests a Christmas trip to his remote lodge. For Aiden and Mia, this is way too soon, and only fuels the idea that their mother is being replaced (here the physical resemblance between Keough and Silverstone is interesting, if maybe not intentional). The kids refuse the invitation, of course, but the film gets them there anyway. When work summons Richard away, Aiden and Mia are left with only Grace – who they’ve branded a “psychopath” – for company. Then weird stuff starts happening. Who, The Lodge asks, is to blame?

Given its perfectly paced, stomach-knotting first act – one that includes a truly unexpected and disturbing scene the film never tops – it’s a shame to discover The Lodge isn’t quite sure how to fill the rest of its time. Nor can it avoid comparisons to last year’s Hereditary, another grief-stricken horror that also had a thing for weird kids, dollhouses, and cults. Whilst The Lodge can’t come close to matching the visceral agony of that film, Franz and Fiala manage a mostly unsettling but never particularly scary yarn that does at least score points for its uneasy atmosphere. The dark and shadowy lodge where much of the action takes place is made sinister and claustrophobic thanks to the interesting lens choices on cinematographer Thimios Bakatakis’s part, whilst a combination of relentless, slow-zooming shots and extreme close-ups add to the feeling of being boxed in by the elements.

But this is a film that spends far too much time simply moving its characters into position. Even when the table is finally set for what should be some nasty fun, Franz and Fiala hide too much, and give too little. The middle section sinks beneath the ice, and so does our attention. It’s only our investment in Grace that keeps us clinging on, as Keough – offering yet another brilliantly nuanced performance in a horror that can’t fulfil its potential (here’s looking at you, It Comes at Night) – makes a bid to rescue The Lodge from its own incoherence on acting prowess alone. She’s so watchable, even when the movie eventually isn’t, you almost forgive it for spinning its wheels. Almost.

As a snow storm rages outside the lodge, one particularly miscalculated moment has Grace, Aiden and Mia killing time watching John Carpenter’s horror classic The Thing. It’s meant to be an amusing nod; later it can only remind us of a film that actually delivered on its narrative promises. Goodnight Mommy – clever, subversive, scary – seemed to announce the arrival of a filmmaking duo with a talent for rule-breaking. The Lodge feels like a step in the wrong direction.

★★★☆☆

By: Tom Barnard

This film was screened to the press as part of the BFI London Film Festival 2019. For more information and showtimes for this year’s festival, head to our dedicated page.