For film nerds surrounded by overly explicit trailers and extensive plot descriptions, there’s joy in watching a movie without clear expectations. Festival screenings, in particular, are great for not knowing what you’re getting into beyond a deliciously vague programming description that can’t adequately prepare you for what you’re about to see. Colin Minihan‘s absolutely gorgeous thriller, “What Keeps You Alive,” is best seen with as little knowledge of its plot as possible, but it drops hints about what’s coming in both dialogue and mood well before the ax falls – and the blood splatters. But even if you’d read a point-by-point breakdown of the film’s plot, “What Keeps You Alive” still has the power to surprise, thanks to its stunning images that make you wonder why most horror films are so visually dull when they have the capacity to look like this.
Wives Jackie (Hannah Emily Anderson) and Jules (Brittany Allen) are celebrating their one-year wedding anniversary at Jackie’s family’s lake house. The quiet vacation home atmosphere quickly transitions from tranquil to terrifying, leaving the characters on screen – and the audience – in shock. This isn’t the first horror movie to exploit the isolation of its location, but Minihan sets his film apart from the pack with an audacious script and equally bold images to match.
Like many other films in its genre, “What Keeps You Alive” requires its characters to make decisions that defy logic, particularly as they move toward the film’s ending. Viewers sitting safely in their seats wouldn’t be wrong in wanting to scream at the screen (please don’t). Minihan’s choices – and the ones he makes for Jackie and Jules – ultimately work, but they make for frustrating viewing in the moment.
Coupled with a soundtrack that veers from Silverchair to Beethoven, the score from star Allen feels like it’s from a much more expensive movie, simultaneously boasting both the polish and texture that are often lacking from smaller films. Similarly, David Schuurman‘s work with the camera elevates the film even higher, literally and figuratively. The cinematography emphasizes the verticality of the trees, making the forest feel like a prison, rather than a place of freedom. The overhead shots here don’t seem like the now-standard drone-helmed video that is plaguing indie movies. But beyond its lovely aerial photography, “What Keeps You Alive” is filled with hauntingly beautiful visuals at ground level, too, often juxtaposed with on-screen horror that should be anything but pretty.
Writer-director Minihan is brutal and unsparing, whether he’s zooming in on self-sewn stitches (shudder) or exposing the frailty of a marriage. He’s crafted an ominous environment from early on, with menacing sound design highlighting the deafening buzz of the wilderness surrounding the lake house. We hear the thrum from every insect and the patter of rain on leaves, with only an actress’s gasps as a respite from a foreboding natural soundtrack. But his screenplay isn’t all doom and gloom; there’s a blackly comic streak here that somehow makes this film about betrayal and bloodshed actually fun, and the two leads ably lead us between the movie’s moments that make you laugh and the ones that make you gasp.
Both Anderson and Allen worked on last year’s “Jigsaw,” but this is another type of horror film entirely. Sure, there are shocking moments, but Minihan is working on a completely different level than most of his so-called peers. You’ll want to pause the film to absorb the beauty of practically every frame, but you won’t want to wait to see what the director has planned for you in the next shot. [B+]
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