by Chris Feil

Horror films of the moment are somewhat defined by their expressiveness, rendering intimate terrors with expulsive force. Jordan Peele is at the fore turning intellectual and social ills into visceral experiences, while Ari Aster borders on expressionism while working within a bizarre emotional toolbox. Elsewhere, the genre has been finding something essential in loudly lurid aesthetics and points of view, like Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria and Coralie Fargeat’s Revenge. Even some of the last month’s horror duds try to find the soul of their scares through bolder stylistic swings.

What makes The Lodge so darkly thrilling is how it goes against the grain at every opportunity to go big. Instead, it does the opposite - what terrifies is when it looks inward toward the void, only a blunt emptiness flows out in response...