Neverlake (2014)

This film is just as effective as any of the really good high dollar films. I was very impressed with this movie - it's different than I was expecting and a lot better than I anticipated. If you liked the films The Others, The Conjuring, The Orphanage or The Woman in Black then you might like Neverlake! I was blown away by how good this film is.I really can't talk much about the film or I will give it away. It's one of those films you will just have to watch for yourself. What I can say is it's a good ghost story (the souls of the lake), a girl with a very strange father and his housekeeper and it has one heck of a great twist so it's more than just a ghost story! That's all I will tell anyone so I won't ruin the movie for first time viewers.This is one of those films that proves you don't need lots of money to create a very effective horror film... all you need is a great writer, cinematographer and actors. I really enjoyed this film.9/10

Jenny is an American teen; born in Italy, she visits her widowed father who lives near a mysterious lake - a real one. On the drive back to his house she sees a young boy in the road, but he doesn't. This and her subsequent meetings with a bizarre collection of apparently sick boys and girls - including one who appears to be blind - beggar the question is it all in her head, or is something else going on?Daddy is a retired surgeon, who retired to study what, precisely? Whatever it is, there is good reason for her to believe it is not what he says it is, not quite, anyway.The riddle of the ghosts is resolved, but wildly improbable plot though this may be, the real monsters are closer to home, and both what they did in the past, and what they intend to do to her is unthinkable.

There are pretty straightforward pros and cons to this movie, and to me it seems to really be stretching things to call it "horrible" or "great storytelling.The story itself - overall - wasn't that bad and, in fact, I enjoyed the ending. It was darker than I'd thought it would be, and definitely not entirely predictable. Ironically, that's also part of the problem. There wasn't really enough story development in the first 70 minutes of the film to lead you to predict much of anything, and by that time you're almost a little apathetic. Very little seems to be holding together what is presented during this stretch, and much of it isn't really that necessary.A lot of the bad reviews I've read include phrases like "I couldn't make it half-way through" and "I turned it off with 20 minutes left." Because the story is so back-loaded into the conclusion of the movie, their reviews (to me) are rendered almost completely irrelevant. But because of the glacial pace I definitely understand where they're coming from.Before I get the usual condescending "Most people (who aren't as smart as I am) who expect explosions and non-stop action/killing/slashing just won't 'get' this type of artistic storytelling (and are not worthy to cast eyes on the film like I am)," I beg to differ. I don't need nonstop action, especially in a horror/psychological thriller movie. But in lieu of action there needs to be story/character development to keep you engaged. And in this film that all came at the end, with only fairly disjointed bits and pieces for the first 70 minutes.I give this a better-than-average rating because it IS better than most of the low-budget garbage out there. It is, indeed, watchable. But your life will not change. You'll think, "Hmmm. Didn't quite see THAT ending coming," then get back to your housework.

I was impressed with the first 5 minutes or so, and that kept me around through this entire movie, however though it was a decent ghost story, there are a lot of really boring moments in it. I felt over all that the first half of the movie could have been titled "The blind leading the ignorant" and that would have been enough to just move past the whole getting to know the children stage. The main theme hidden under the ghost story, and the mystery itself is that you must pay attention to the foreshadowing, and they try very hard to get you to notice this "subtly". Jenny's Dad is evil, sorry I had to just blurt it out like that but without that he just look like a looming specter himself, and you need a bit more Dad meat in the first half of the story to establish him, or he just comes across as flat as he does. Joy Tanner is as good as she usually is, except, well what accent is she supposed to have, and where does it keep going. Beyond the accent she is as evil from the first scene she appears in as you think she will be, and that takes something right? Overall I Enjoyed this, I would say it is aimed at a younger demographic surely, the romantic poetry spouting twenty somethings, and younger yet, but you young at heart, lonely hearts might like it as well. It is not a scary sort of ghost story, it is simply a story of revenge that has been a long time coming as these stories usually are.Jesse of www.Jesse.ca