Bone Lake & Good Boy

Expectations in seeing a movie can make a lot of difference. When I saw the trailer for Bone Lake, I thought it was going to be yet another “young people in the woods meet the sharp side of a machete” flick, but when I actually saw the film, I was pleasantly surprised by its intelligence, wicked humor and suspense. The actors are all terrific, and the cinematography and production design are quite good. And it played very well with an audience, who were yelling and clapping as they connected with its satisfying twists and turns.

Sage (Maddie Hasson) and Diego (Marco Pigossi) are driving to a rental house next to picturesque Bone Lake for a romantic weekend. Although they’ve been a couple for a while, cracks are beginning to show in the relationship. Diego quit his community college teaching job to write a novel, but Sage secretly resents having to pay the bills while Diego writes, and she also doesn’t think he’s a good writer. He’s also no longer satisfying her in bed, which doesn’t help. 

Diego, oblivious to these problems, is intending to propose to Sage this weekend, and he has brought his grandmother’s ring. Everything looks great when they get to the large rental house, until a knock at the door reveals another couple, Will (Alex Roe) and Cin (Andra Nechita). It turns out that the house has been double-booked, and, not without reservations, the couples decide to share the roomy rental. Will and Cin are both charming and attractive, and before long Sage and Diego are beginning to doubt their partner’s honesty and fidelity and perhaps starting to wonder why the area is called Bone Lake.

Pigossi is sympathetic as the hapless Diego, not comprehending the odds that are stacked against him. Hasson delivers a cooler performance in terms of emotional temperature; we’re not sure for a long time what she’s really thinking, which creates compelling drama. Nechita excels as a clever seductress, and Roe steals the show with his gleefully manipulative portrayal.

Director Mercedes Bryce Morgan brings a lot of visual energy to the film, using the camera in creative ways (including turning them clockwise when opening some locks) and spending plenty of time building up tension between the characters until having it explode in the very effective conclusion. The very beginning of the movie is an attention-grabber, too, as two naked people are being hunted through the woods until one unfortunate lad gets an arrow through his testicles. Haven’t seen that before.

Joshua Friedlander’s script is darkly amusing (“When I was booking (the house), I specifically checked the box for no pervert host”) and deliberately uncomfortable, putting his characters through an emotional wringer of mistrust and sexual jealousy. There are plenty of great moments, from Sage floating in the lake and feeling what she doesn’t know is a car hood under her feet to Will and Cin dancing around with delight at one of their victories. 

Bone Lake is a very well-crafted film, not so much for originality but for the excellence of its execution, and I recommend it.

Good Boy

Expectations again. I was aware of the good buzz Good Boy had garnered from the festival circuit, and I’d been looking forward to seeing it for months. Having been a critic for thirty-five years, I was also well aware that raised expectations are not a good idea. That being said, I was disappointed with the movie, and the audience I saw it with seemed distinctly underwhelmed. But it’s not really a traditional film, anyway – it’s an impressive stunt.

The story, such as it is, follows Todd (Shane Jensen), who’s suffering from some lung ailment, who moves into his grandfather’s remote old house in the woods, bringing his faithful dog, Indy, with him for company. The house is rumored to be haunted, and the grandfather died there under mysterious circumstances. The story is told from Indy’s point of view, all barks and whines and soulful looks, as a supernatural presence stalks the house. Indy tries to protect his master to the best of his ability, but Todd is coughing up blood and things are looking dire.

It’s hard to talk about the performances in the movie, because due to the specific shooting requirements of the film (which I’ll discuss shortly), you almost never see Todd’s face. His vocal performance seems adequate to the project, but not much more. Larry Fessenden does a cameo as Grandpa in flashbacks, but doesn’t really add much more to the film other than thoughts of “Hey, what’s Larry Fessenden doing in this?” Indy is of course adorable and no doubt a very good boy indeed, but as the filmmakers reveal after the credits, not only is he not performing but also has no idea he’s in a movie.

This is why I describe the project as a stunt more than a film. As a movie, the story is semi-incoherent and generic. It develops a certain amount of suspense from loud scary music and shadowy atmosphere and special effects, but the only thing that really works in it is our affection for Indy. But the way in which this stunt was made is kind of amazing. 

From what director Ben Leonberg explains after the credits, he and a very small crew spent three years filming his dog, Indy, at home looking at various things and doing small actions. He was supposedly never subjected to anything remotely scary – all of that was added in post-production. This is why you almost never see Todd’s face, so while shooting and having to act sick or scared, he’d never upset Indy. The filmmakers show an example of filming in which Indy looks like he’s in a dark haunted house full of music and spooky sounds, when in reality he was sitting on a bed in his house surrounded by his people in a brightly lit room.

I found all of that fascinating and very relieving – I didn’t want to be entertained by somebody scaring a dog to make a movie. And they didn’t, which is nice. Unfortunately, it didn’t make for a very memorable film.