The Reeds

I wasn't really sure what this movie was on about at first. Netflix kept bugging me to watch it, recommending it over and over, and so it was inevitable that I'd eventually give in and give it a chance (it IS horror movie month after all) but at first things are really confusing. Some friends decide to head away for a weekend boating trip out in the boonies. They keep seeing strange things, like a group of creepy local kids who appear to be overly violent and menacing. At first, the guy they rented the boat from says that he doesn't have any boats left, but they've traveled so for that they don't want to turn back (bad idea, that) so they use money to persuade him to rent them a boat, and after another run-in with the creepy local kids, they are on their way. At first they have fun, but when a storm hits that night, everything starts to go wrong at once. Trapped in the marshy darkness, ghostly things start to happen, the friends are separated, and everything starts to go to hell in a handbasket (or in a rickety old boat, as the case may be).

The biggest problem I had with this movie was that while there was lots of creepy imagery, it never seemed to be tied to anything concrete having to do with the plot. Characters keep looking out into the marsh and seeing ghostly images that are visions of themselves with black holes where their eyes should be, and that creeps me out because I get freaked whenever anything happens involving eyes, but I didn't really get why they would see themselves out in the storm, and for awhile I thought the movie was just throwing creepy crap at us to freak us out with no purpose, which irks me because I don't care for jump scares with no substance or plot. After a bit, though, I started to see the pattern of the movie, and there's a complex plot going on here that impressed me. Every twist builds upon the one before until the movie unfolds like a puzzle. In fact, it's not until the very last shot of the film that everything totally ties together, and it was a satisfyingly creepy conclusion for me. I like mindfuck movies that mess with your head, and this movie does that in spades, so I had fun with it.