Wrong Turn (2021)

At the last count, I think there were approximately twenty films in the Wrong Turn movie series. I could be misremembering, but I'm fairly sure that I'm correct. Every movie was pretty much the same; some inbred cannibals pick off numerous victims, often using some traps dotted around the vast woodlands they call home.

This Wrong Turn is a reboot written by the same writer of the original film, Alan B. McElroy, and there's enough here to keep horror fans happy. But there are also a couple of key points that may work against it. I'll come to those later.

Matthew Modine plays Scott Shaw, a father who arrives in a small town near the Appalachian Trail on a search for his daughter, who he hasn't heard from in about six weeks. Jumping back to six weeks previously, viewers are shown what happened to his daughter, Milla (Charlotte Vega), and the friends that she was travelling with. And what happened to them involved some woodland traps, an accident or two, and a self-sufficient community known as 'The Foundation', headed up by Venable (Bill Sage).

Directed by Mike P. Nelson, Wrong Turn is a well-balanced mix of nasty gore gags and attempts to be more seriously disturbing. Helped by McElroy's script, fans of the series will like the fact that they get something very much the same, but different. Traps are used, unwitting travellers are caught unawares, and the main villains are a very tight-knit "family". 

Vega is a decent lead, she's allowed to show some real strength in the moments that have her character doing whatever needs to be done as she keeps survival in her sights, but no other members of her troupe really stand out, unfortunately. Sage is an impressive head villain, always a threat and always seeming one step ahead of the protagonists. Modine does well with his supporting role, and gets more involved with the main events during the third act. The other main person to mention is Tim DeZarn, playing a local who may or may not be wishing misfortune upon the young travellers. 

And yet the small differences are enough to stop this from feeling in line with the pure horror entertainment vibe of the original movie. It may seem churlish, but the plotting here, the use of 'The Foundation' instead of those crazy cannibals, stops it from feeling like a Wrong Turn film. Although McElroy may have wanted to revisit his earlier work and rework it, perhaps it could have been better to just have it as a new, original(-ish) horror property. Although that would leave them unable to sell this as a recognisable brand name.

Overall, it's a decent film, especially if you don't pick apart all the holes in the logic of it. It's worth a watch. It just doesn't seem to fit alongside all of the other movies with Wrong Turn in the title.

6/10

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The Lodgers (2017)

Bryan O'Malley can do atmosphere. He proved that with the enjoyable Let Us Prey. And he proves it again with The Lodgers, a film literally dripping with wet and gloomy atmosphere in a number of memorable scenes. He's helped himself this time around by also casting a better selection of actors for the main roles. Sadly, this time around sees him hampered by a weak script and some strange choices made that allow the film to simultaneously feel as if it is revealing secrets and moving forward while at the same time not really showing us anything or going anywhere.

The plot revolves around twins named Rachel (Charlotte Vega) and Edward (Bill Milner), living in their family home in Ireland. It's one of those big houses in the middle of nowhere, of course, and Rachel and Edward have to abide by rules set out in a very simple rhyme. Those rules include not letting others into the house, staying together, and being in bed by midnight. Yes, as you can maybe guess, those rules end up being broken, leading the pair into danger.

With nice turns from Vega and Milner in the lead roles, the latter having to be almost permanently morose throughout, and solid supporting work from the likes of Eugene Simon, Moe Dunford, and David Bradley, The Lodgers is a horror film that has had obvious care taken with almost every aspect. It's a brooding mood movie, more akin to something like Crimson Peak than, for example, The Quiet Ones, and not just because of the period setting. This is old-fashioned gothic melodrama, something that was closely bubbling under the surface of Let Us Prey, and that seems to be what O'Malley prefers in his horror (no bad thing).

Unfortunately, all of the good work from the actors, and all of the atmosphere, is undone by a weak script from David Turpin. It looks to be a first feature from him, which makes sense. Turpin is so caught up in the moodiness and vague sense of creepiness here and there that he forgets to underpin the events with anything more tangible, even as he takes the time to create friction between our two main characters and the locals (with Dunford woefully underused as a potential threat, more's the pity).

And yet . . . The Lodgers isn't BAD. It's not a film trying to be overly pretentious, or even trying to peek out from below genre robes and show that it's not really a horror at all. It's just a decent tale undermined by some weak writing, which bodes well for the day that O'Malley finally matches up his talent with a talented cast and the right script for him. He keeps doing good work, and I know that he's creeping closer to giving us something great.

6/10

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