supernatural

THE ISLAND BETWEEN THE TIDES: what dimension is this?

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Paloma Kwiatkowski in THE ISLAND BETWEEN THE TIDES. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The Island Between the Tides: In this supernatural thriller, a young girl wanders away from her parents on the isolated British Columbia coastline and returns seemingly the same. As a young woman, she disappears again, and this time returns 20 years later, but at the same age as when she left. She’s trying to figure out what has happened, as is the family who has been grieving her loss for twenty years, not to mention her son, who is now older than she is. They and the audience are bouncing between the unsettling possible explanations of delusion and disassociation, ghosts or a dimension where beings move to and may be trapped in different times.

The story is based on the play Mary Rose by Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie, which I’ve read that Hitchcock wanted to adapt, but couldn’t overcome studio suits finding it “too troubling”. Impressive feature debut for writer-directors Austin Andrews and Andrew Holmes. 

Paloma Kwiatkowski is good as the protagonist, and she is ably supported by Donal Logue, Camille Sullivan and David Mazouz. I always enjoy Adam Beach, and here he gets to play a sunny, non-brooding role,

Cinequest hosts the world premiere as Cinequest’s opening night film. The Island Between the Tides is one of my Best of Cinequest.

NINA OF THE WOODS: finding the supernatural – but for real this time

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Megan Hensley in Charlie Griak’s NINA OF THE WOODS, premiering at Cinequest. Photo courtesy of Cinequest.

The supernatural thriller Nina of the Woods follows a cynical reality TV crew into a forest; the struggling actress Nina (Megan Hensley) has signed on to the gig, and the shoot happens to take place where Nina grew up. This is one of those lurid shows about the supposed supernatural – sensationalizing phenomena from aliens to Sasquatch; these guys are used to creating the ILLUSION of the supernatural, not FINDING the supernatural. Everyone gets a surprise.

The show’s on-screen host Jeremy (Daniel Bielinski) is the biggest asshole, but this is mostly a jaded bunch. As the crew sneers at the working class locals, they get some truth from Eric the camera guy (Ricardo Vázquez),

These are the people who actually watch your show.  Average people.  This is who you do it for…. “Reality”. This is reality. Not what we do.  No one would want to watch the real thing anyway.   It’s too much and too boring all at the same time. Who would care?

A local backwoods guide (Shawn Patrick Boyd) is hired; he is a very serious guy who respects the menace of this particular forest. Nina, having been raised by a father with a spiritual sense of the forest, can also sense something off kilter.

Now something happens that is unexplainable on the time/space matrix. Weird shit happens, and the party happens upon more than they bargained for.

Director and co-writer Charlie Griak unsettles us without employing gore or monsters. Nothing is as unsettling as when our reality is challenged.

In 2015, Cinequest hosted the world premiere of Griak’s debut feature (The Center), a remarkably good drama about recruitment for a Scientology-like cult. Hensley played Annika in The Center.

Griak inserts file footage of old Northwest lumberjacks at work with some very cool Foley.

Cinequest hosts the world premiere of Nina of the Woods.