The Midnight Swim
Director: Sarah Adina Smith
Writer: Sarah Adina Smith
Cast: Lindsay Burdge, Jennifer Lafleur, Aleksa Palladino, Ross Partridge, Beth Grant
Part of: FrauenFilmTage
Seen on: 01.03.2015

Plot:
After experienced diver Amelia Brooks (Beth Grant) disappears in the lake next to her house – a lake that is so deep, no diver has ever reached the bottom – her estranged daughters June (Lindsay Burdge), Annie (Jennifer Lafleur) and Isa (Aleksa Palladino) travel to her home next to the lake. They want to say good-bye to both their mother and the house where they spent, their childhood and reconnect with each other as well. But when they invoke the spirit of the Seven Sisters – a local legend – their days and nights there turn a little eerie.

I absolutely fell in love with The Midnight Swim. It’s one of my favorite movies this year, at least so far (but I can hardly imagine that it wouldn’t make a Top 10 list at the end of the year). It is so many things at once – from family drama to horror film – but it also doesn’t fit into any of those categories comfortably. But it doesn’t matter, because it is an absolutely magical experience either way.

The film is shot found footage style. June is a neurotic and obsessive documentary maker who films everything – and its her shots that we get to see. Usually I don’t like found footage films (with one notable exception so far) but The Midnight Swim uses the concept very cleverly and in a way that I have yet to see in another film: [SPOILERS] with a – possibly? – unreliable narrator. Since we’re so used to video footage being irrefutable proof, it was exciting to see it handled that way. [/SPOILERS]

Whether it is due to or despite this structure, The Midnight Swim – which was in no way touted as a horror film when I bought my ticket – manages to be scarier than many horror movies I’ve seen, because I was just so caught up in the atmosphere – and that even though nothing really big ever happens. But the film is also funny and warm and tragic and dramatic – it cannot be reduced to eeriness alone.

But even more important than the mood were the sisters and their relationship with each other and their mother. Their relationships are completely believable from the get-go, where they are created with broad strokes, continuously being refined during the film to show that they may all have their predefined roles, but things aren’t as simple as that. (It would be interesting to know whether they all have sisters. It sure felt that way.)

That can only work because of the great cast. All three of the sisters get their moment(s) to shine, but Jennifer Lafleur might have the best of those moments, or she makes most of hers, I don’t know. In any case when she roleplays their mother, I had goosebumps running up an down my arm.

That Smith manages to put all of this together – and what is more, in her debut feature – is really impressive and wonderful.

Summarizing: Amazing.