COLD MOON (2016)

Studio:       Uncork’d Entertainment
Director:    Griff Furst
Writer:       Michael McDowell, Jack Snyder, Griff Furst
Producer:  Griff Furst, Isaiah LaBorde, Stephen Furst
Stars:     Josh Stewart, Candy Clark, Robbie A. Kay, Frank Whaley, Christopher Lloyd, Sara Catherine Bellamy, Joe Chrest, Rachele Brooke Smith, Chester Rushing

Review Score:

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Summary:

The murder of a teenage girl unravels a supernatural mystery in a small Florida town.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Babylon, Florida – 1989 – Leaving her older brother Jerry and their grandmother Evelyn at the family blueberry farm, 16-year-old Margaret Larkin bikes into town to help a teacher, Warren Perry, inventory textbooks at the high school. On her ride home in the rain, a masked attacker throws Margaret and her bike over a wooden bridge into the stream below. The killer ties Margaret to her bike and she drowns.

The next day, Evelyn and Jerry report Margaret’s disappearance to Sheriff Ted Hale. Ted begins his investigation by questioning Warren Perry. Ted becomes suspicious that there may have been more to Margaret’s relationship with her teacher.

Nathan Redfield, who took over presidency of the local bank when his elderly father James took ill, discusses late payments on the farm with Evelyn and Jerry.

Margaret’s ghost seemingly rises from the water during the night. In the morning, fisherman Ed Gieger finds Margaret and her bike in the stream. Ted learns from the coroner that Margaret was four months pregnant. At Margaret’s funeral, Jerry tells Ted that Evelyn experienced a vision during which she became convinced that Nathan murdered her granddaughter.

Nathan has sex in the forest with Belinda Hale, who helps care for his father. Belinda and Nathan both experience haunting visions of Margaret’s ghost. Visions of Margaret continue plaguing Nathan.

Ted asks Evelyn if Warren Perry could have been the father of Margaret’s baby. Evelyn insists that Nathan murdered Margaret, and accuses Ted of protecting Nathan because of the Redfield Family’s wealth. When local lawyer Charles Darrish refuses to prosecute Nathan based on Evelyn’s suspicion, Evelyn threatens to instead retain attorney Henry Harp, who is Warren Perry’s cousin in Pensacola.

Charles warns Nathan about Evelyn. Nathan and Charles also discuss a business partnership involving a lucrative property buyout that requires the Larkins to default on their debts.

Nathan recruits his younger brother Ben to help him scare the Larkins. Ben distracts Evelyn and Jerry at the bridge on their drive home from Pensacola. To Ben’s shock, Nathan then murders Evelyn and Jerry using a sword. Nathan forces his brother to help him push the Larkins’ car into a pond.

Nathan plants the sword in Warren Perry’s car. Nathan then tells Ted that he has witnessed Warren eyeing Ted’s daughter Belinda when she is over at the Redfield house. Nathan also reports that his sword was stolen.

Girl scouts picking berries at the Larkin farm find the dead bodies of Jerry and Evelyn in the water. The sheriff has their car pulled from the pond. Warren is arrested when police find Nathan’s sword in Warren’s trunk.

Haunting visions lead Nathan to the cemetery. Margaret’s coffin rises from the ground and explodes. Terrifying visions of Margaret, Jerry, and Evelyn force Nathan to race home.

The next day, Ted notices the dirt all over Nathan’s truck before checking on Warren at the jail. Nathan and Charles sign papers for their business deal. Ted is called to the cemetery for the destroyed coffins and finds the Larkin corpses missing.

Nathan and Ben go to dinner with Charles and his wife Ginny. Visions of all three dead Larkins cause Nathan to tackle a woman as he runs out of the restaurant. Based on Nathan’s strange behavior, Charles tells his wife that he now believes Nathan murdered Margaret.

A phone call from a realty company reveals to Ted that Nathan claimed to represent the Larkins in a property buyout. Charles also reports his suspicion about Nathan to Ted.

Nathan convinces Ben to leave town with him. Upon hearing that Nathan plans to abandon the bank, James threatens to cut off Nathan from the family fortune. Nathan forges a suicide note in preparation for killing his father.

Guessing Nathan’s plan, Ginny and another woman race to the Redfield house to retrieve James before Nathan can get to him. However, they do not rescue Belinda.

Thinking he sees Evelyn’s ghost, Nathan knocks Belinda to the ground outside with a loose brick. Thinking his brother is Jerry’s ghost, Nathan tears off Ben’s head with a piece of broken glass. Margaret’s ghost chases Nathan to his garage.

Ted and Charles arrive at the Redfield house. Nathan runs over Charles as he races out of the driveway. Ted finds his daughter clinging to life by the pool.

Nathan confronts all three ghosts at the bridge by the Larkin farm. Margaret’s ghost appears inside his car, forcing Nathan to drive off the bridge and into the water below.

As cops pull Nathan’s car from the water in the morning, Ted learns that Belinda will be fine and Warren was released. Cops find Nathan’s body in his front seat and missing an ear. The Larkin corpses are found in the back of the car. Nathan’s missing ear is discovered clutched inside Margaret’s hand.

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Review:

Small town murders have a habit of unspooling deeper mysteries in movies, but “Cold Moon’s” comes with a supernatural twist.  When Margaret Larkin goes missing from her family’s Floridian blueberry farm, Margaret’s grandmother Evelyn has an immediate culprit in mind.  Since his elderly father fell ill, Nathan Redfield took control of his family’s fortune as well as the local bank.  Nathan now has his eyes on seizing the Larkin land, and Evelyn thinks his dirty hands are involved in foul play.

Sheriff Ted Hale has another name for the potential villain list.  It seems Margaret may not have been a model 16-year-old after all, prompting Ted to wonder if there was more to her student-teacher relationship with Mr. Perry at the high school.

As a tug-of-war rope tightens between two top suspects, a wider web spins around Nathan’s little brother Ben, his father’s flirty caretaker Belinda, and a pair of lawyers looking to take down opposing families.  Once one ghost rises from the water and two more corpses go into it, a domino line of deaths tips over with gravely ghoulish consequences for everyone involved.

With a deeper vocabulary, I could accurately summarize how “Cold Moon” fires simultaneous hits and misses using a few precise words.  First instincts beg to settle on “quirky” as an adjective for the film’s choppy cinematic style, but that suggests a buoyant tone that definitely doesn’t fit.  “Bizarre” comes to mind too, though the movie has a tame personality that can’t wear that hat either.  For lack of a more academic term, let’s simply say that while “Cold Moon” is not at all a total loss because of or in spite of its oddness, nearly everything about it is a little bit “off” in some way.

Based on a novel by Michael McDowell, “Cold Moon” falls into the classic adaptation trap of cramming too many book pages into 90 minutes worth of movie.  The mystery motivating the main narrative has no practical use for subplots involving bank lien legalities or thematic threads about modern caste system politics.  Not that “Cold Moon” overloads on such side stories, but a stacked roster of minor characters who could have been combined or removed altogether smacks of shoehorned inclusions a brisk film doesn’t have time to develop.

Sadly, that’s exactly the case with Christopher Lloyd, who spends his scant few scenes in a wheelchair playing a part that amounts to a prop.  Take out Lloyd’s father figure, explain Nathan’s path to wealth another way, and “Cold Moon” can safely skip one of its surplus beats.

Of course, no one, particularly producers, would argue against including Lloyd in anything, no matter how ultimately irrelevant.  “Cold Moon” casts a number of other notable names such as Josh Stewart and Frank Whaley in beefier roles, although no one turns in top work.  Performances all around function well enough, yet director Griff Furst has everyone speaking in a Southern drawl that sounds natural for no one.  Then there is someone like Candy Clark who turns her emote meter for grief to 11, sobbing over a traumatic revelation as though her limbs were being ripped off while burning to death in fiery acid.

Acting essentially becomes Exhibit A of what was alluded to earlier.  All of the right pieces are in place, except everything is tuned in a slightly strange fashion.

Other elements fall under a similar spell of maybe making sense as a piece while not fully fitting into the whole.  Nathan Furst’s moody score is perfect perhaps for a Gothic haunted house shocker while being overdramatic for the action on hand here.  Strange staging, one example features a murder suspect standing next to the sheriff at the victim’s funeral and another has the two brothers conversing while one takes a steamy bath nude, regularly raises eyebrows.  Again, nothing is weird enough to sink the ship, although “Cold Moon” takes on water because of its choices.

I don’t wish to pigeonhole director Griff Furst just because his résumé includes titles like “Swamp Shark,” “Ghost Shark,” and “Trailer Park Shark.”  Work is work and there’s no shame in making a living at any tier of professional filmmaking.  But those credits create cause to question if Furst’s sensibilities make him the best helmer to handle a multilayered, Southern fried ghost story, which requires more nuance than a Syfy creature feature.

Something the film tries to establish is a “maybe it’s a manifestation of his guilt” possibility behind the hauntings.  Except overzealousness to incorporate paranormal spooks has Furst shooting standalone scenes of a ghost rising from its grave or a second person experiencing terrifying visions, independent of the “all in his mind” man.  “Cold Moon” can’t walk a line between psychological thriller and supernatural horror show using mismatched perspectives.

The script also follows a crooked path as a vengeful ghost yarn.  By amping up the body count as the runtime rolls forward, taking that revenge comes with a steep price of additional innocent lives being taken or ruined so one spirit can get its due.

Speaking more positively, several superlative scare sequences come courtesy of creative FX, even if several jump out for being jarring than for being cleverly constructed.  Yet again, it’s another instance of coloring outside the lines enough for an audience to notice something doesn’t feel right.

These kinds of conflicts have me almost as uncertain of what to rate “Cold Moon” as the movie is uncertain of itself.  Despite preceding criticism, I still engaged with the movie because of its strong production value and stronger intent to have more entertaining scope than an ordinary supernatural murder mystery.  Oddness aside, a good thriller exists within “Cold Moon.”  An even better one exists there too, wishing for a streamlined script and more confident hand to steward it into the sunlight.

Review Score:  65

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