We love a Final Girl. You know, the girl who survives at the end of a horror film. Famed final girls include Halloween’s Jamie Lee Curtis, Scream’s Nev Campbell, and I Know What You Did Last Summer’s Jennifer Love Hewitt. I remember watching the recently released Evil Dead Rise and thinking about the characters and all the therapy they’d need if they survived their night of terror. This notion inspired writer and director Olivia West Lloyd to create the psychological thriller Somewhere Quiet. Meg Rhoads is our final girl, and this film picks up after surviving a traumatic event.
It’s been months after the kidnapping, and Meg (Jennifer Kim; Dr. Death) is still coping with the trauma she’s endured. Meg travels with her husband Scott (Kentucker Audley; She Dies Tomorrow) to his family’s isolated compound in Cape Cod, hoping that a little peace and quiet will aid in Meg’s recovery.
Shortly after they arrive, Meg discovers that Scott’s overbearing cousin, Madelin (Marin Ireland; The Boogeyman), is staying next door. Scott and Madelin are eerily close. As time passes, and tension mounts, Meg experiences nightmares, delusions, and heightened paranoia.
On the surface, Lloyd’s feature debut presents as a psychological thriller. As the story unfolds, it lays true to that genre. Things aren’t adding up, and we trust no one. We’re “team Meg.” We roll our eyes whenever the cousin comes around; we’re annoyed with the husband.
The cracks in Meg and Scott’s relationship are noticeable from the beginning. In fact, for a moment, you might consider that this film will veer more of a Lifetime “let’s take a trip to the river” sort of way. It’s common for a husband to take his wife “somewhere quiet” to engage in sinister activity.
But Lloyd keeps us on our toes which is where the horror comes in. Although we’re always team Meg, we never stop considering whether Meg is a reliable narrator. Meg is recovering from a traumatic incident that left her fractured. That’s where the horror lies. There are few things more horrific than the inability to trust your own mind.
Lloyd makes notable choices from the start. For example, horror films often use road kill as a foreshadowing device. We often see a deer, a raccoon, or some other animal already dead on the road or hit on screen. Here, Lloyd opens the film with a man scooping up a dead swan — an elegant and graceful bird known for its beauty. The juxtaposition of this pure animal being scraped off the road is almost a retelling of Meg’s traumatic event.
Kim’s performance is excellent. Her portrayal of Meg embodies many components: fragile, tender, frightful, and resilient. Audley and Ireland play well off her skittish character leaving the audience to feel as unsure as Kim is about their motives.
Lloyd’s use of silence in this film fills the scenes with wonder. Is this true? Is this happening? Are they in cahoots? Is Meg losing her mind? The tension mounds with the unspoken until the bark of a dog or the loud snore of a sleeping husband brings us to attention.
The dynamic between Madeline and Meg is fascinating. Madeline’s audacious presence threatens Meg’s tranquility. She moves in like a tornado at the very moment Meg seems to be most at peace.
Although the pacing might be a little slow for some viewers before you would consider it boring, Lloyd shakes things up to keep the audience engaged. The thread pulls, and you’ll endure along with Meg until you yank the string of the mystery at hand. And don’t think for a second that Lloyd makes it easy to uncover.
Somewhere Quiet is a crestfallen thriller that portrays the arduous path of a fractured mind striving to heal from trauma — a journey every final girl must travel.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Other Articles
Horror-Comedy ‘The Blackening’ Is One for the Culture
No Comment! Be the first one.