Bone Lake

Bone Lake is the kind of "horror-thriller" that thinks it's clever because it borrows ideas from clever films. You'll immediately recognize familiar setups from Barbarian (double-booked rental and they decide to stay with the unfamiliar party) and The One I Love (couples confronting relationship woes and get a lake house as therapy only to start not trusting each other), and many others, but without the originality, tension, or emotional payoff that made those films memorable.

Despite a decent setting and a momentary uptick in energy around the hour mark, the film is weighed down by a weak script, flat performances, and a complete lack of suspense or scares. It feels like a patchwork of better movies with the edges left rough and the soul missing.

I wouldn't recommend it unless you need background noise or a reminder of how important good writing is to genre filmmaking.

Domestic thriller much in the vein of Speak No Evil - polite smiles, social discomfort and sexual tension.

Setup's simple and effective: two couples accidentally book the same remote vacation rental. Could've been the premise for a rom-com - but a quick hunter-vs-prey prologue rails us off with the promise of blood to come.

It starts off a bit clunky (dialogue, acting, even the sex), but steadily finds its footing. What begins as mild awkwardness turns into a seductive and manipulative erotic thriller - just a bit too polite for its own good: it simmers, but never quite boils.

A few twists, more or less predictable, but the fun part comes when the third act drops the pretense, grabs an axe, and drenches everything red. Chainsaws, flying limbs, and some good laughs - the whole thing slips from Speak No Evil to splatter comedy without blinking.

A little clumsy, a little clever, but entertaining once it cuts loose.

Bone Lake is one of those films that looks and feels like it's about to go somewhere dark and thrilling but never quite dives all the way in. Directed by Mercedes Bryce Morgan and written by Joshua Friedlander, this indie horror-thriller premiered at Fantastic Fest in 2024 before making its wide release in October 2025. It's stylish, atmospheric, and well-acted, but it also feels a bit too restrained for its own good.

The story follows Sage (Maddie Hasson) and Diego (Alex Roe), a couple looking to rekindle their relationship during a romantic escape to the secluded Bone Lake. Their peaceful retreat turns complicated when they're forced to share a lavish mansion with another couple... Will (Marco Pigossi) and Cin (Andra Nechita) whose charm quickly slides into something much more sinister. What begins as a slightly awkward double date turns into a tense mind game where trust, temptation, and truth blur together.

The marketing for Bone Lake sells it as an erotic thriller, but aside from the provocative opening scene-which features a moment that will make most men instinctively cross their legs-the "erotic" aspect is surprisingly mild. After that opening, the film shifts gears into something closer to a psychological relationship test than a steamy thriller. The tension simmers but never boils, and while there's a constant sense that something is off, it rarely hits that nerve jangling level you want from a film like this.

That's not to say it's a bad movie far from it. Maddie Hasson and Alex Roe give strong, grounded performances, and Andra Nechita and Marco Pigossi bring an unsettling energy that keeps things interesting. Mercedes Bryce Morgan's direction is confident, with moody cinematography that captures both the beauty and unease of isolation. You can feel the influence of films like Speak No Evil and The Rental, where the horror comes more from social discomfort and suspicion than gore or jump scares.

Still, Bone Lake feels a bit too safe. The film teases danger, seduction, and psychological warfare, but often pulls back right when it's about to get good. It's an "almost" movie-almost erotic, almost scary, almost profound. What's left is a decent watch that scratches the surface of deeper, darker ideas without ever taking the plunge.

With so many slasher films around, you have to make a bit of an effort, but this took over an hour to get to any action. Compared to Companion, Maleficent, and a few others, it was lacking in all slasher expectations, such as a high body count, intense gore, and a faster pace. The leads did a good job, but I started to notice the pace was slow and checked my watch a few times. Not a bad film, just overly long and not even trying for originality. Lots of people are putting the score at a 7, for me it's a 5.

"Bone Lake" follows a troubled couple, Sage and Diego, who rent a sprawling lakeside estate for the weekend. They are soon met by the outgoing Will and Cin, who also booked the house through an apparently double-booking error. Rather than give up the house, the couples agree to share it for the weekend, only for inevitable mind games and mayhem to ensue.

After reading some divisive feedback, I went into "Bone Lake" with very low expectations, which may have worked to the film's advantage in terms of the entertainment value I found here. While it is a flawed film, I was pleasantly surprised by it. It is ridiculous in a number of ways and requires a fair suspension of disbelief, but it is a slick-looking and fairly fun flick that leans much more into thriller territory than it does outright horror.

An isolated estate? Check. Two couples, both strangers in a strange place? Check. An apparent history of a serial killer who dumps bodies in the lake? Check. At first glance, the film has the aura of something like a "Friday the 13th" sequel, but it plays much more like a semi-sexual psychothriller from the early 2000s. This might bore audiences expecting an all-out slasher flick, and the film does admittedly sag a bit in the middle as it revels in relationship drama and mind games that seem to have no tangible purpose. However, things really pick up in the last act, and this is where most of the real fun begins.

The performances are actually quite good, with Maddie Hasson and Andra Nechita specifically offering the most believable portrayals here. The photography and editing are uniformly stylish, and the pacing is overall nicely executed, despite the film's somewhat long-in-the-tooth midsection.

All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by this film. If you are expecting something that takes itself very seriously, you will not find that here. "Bone Lake" functions best as a throwback to early aughts thrillers with a slight edge of millennial sexual politics and relationship woes. "Funny Games" it is not, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. 7/10.