Lyle

This is a slow burn movie...I enjoyed it. Along the lines of Rosemary's baby with a modern feel. Great acting from the lead.

When a movie is offered free (and legally) online to stream, and is only an hour in length, it is usually worth a stab. I had previously seen the trailer, which was well put together and struck enough curiosity within me to jot down the date upon which it would become accessible online.

So, what is it about? In short, this movie is about grief, and the effects that traumatic events can have on the mind. It begins with our main character Leah (Gaby Hoffman) and her girlfriend June (Ingrid Jungermann) being shown around an impressive New York apartment, with which they are clearly pleased. They have with them a toddler, and the witting building manager Karen (Rebecca Street) guesses that Leah is pregnant with another, a feat that Karen herself is openly trying to achieve.

Leah and June seem happy with their new life in New York. June is busy at work and on the road to success, whilst Leah is at home with the toddler unpacking their lives into their new home. There is, however, an event that turns their lives around. Although it is openly available on the short Synopsis, I will refrain from mentioning the details. This event is portrayed in a very clever way, again which i refuse to disclose (although I will say that it is a very original idea, utilising modern communication methods).

With this traumatic event, we see Leah's mind begin to unravel. She becomes suspicious of those around her, notably the building manager, and her paranoia gradually escalates into a final scene that is very well composed.

However, despite the film's unusually short length, there are periods in which one wonders in which direction the film is going. This is countered, it should be noted, by a good score which retains the film's eeriness throughout these moments in which the film seems to be petering along without purpose. Another essential distraction from this flaw in the narrative is the acting of Hoffman, who at times seems very accomplished indeed. There are moments when she perhaps gets carried away with the high-emotion scenes, but nonetheless her performance is a mile apart from most of her supporting cast (notably poor are Michael Che and Kim Allen, who play a friend of the couple and a neighbour, respectively, and fail to really portray emotion at any time during the film. This is particularly so in Che's case, in the final scenes of the film).

All in all, Lyle is an optimistic venture into the grief of the human mind, ultimately let down by its lack of direction and poor supporting acting. An interesting point for debate is whether writer/director Stewart Thorndike could have added ten or twenty more pages of screenplay, to try and flesh out some of the ideas throughout the movie which do not enjoy the focus that they deserve. Nonetheless, it was an adventurous film, and it hits home just well enough to make the viewer keep an eye on whether his new film will reach its Kickstarter target.

Staying within its indie roots, this movie is well made (at that indie level) and decently acted. But, the concept becomes cornered within its own plot leaving the film without a fuller execution. Leah becomes unhinged after the death of her daughter Lyle while pregnant with her second. She descends into paranoia judging ever person and act as out to harm her, or her unborn baby, or caused the death of Lyle. . Gaby Hoffman plays Leah well even if at the end the role only demands her to be "crazy". The 60 or so run time feels warranted, not trying to extend a concept past its limits and at the same time it left me with some unfulfilled aspects.

A well made film with an obvious plot debt to Rosemary's Baby. I can't say the RB genre is over saturated just yet, so it was still a fun watch.

This movie masquerades under the guise of woman-driven horror movie, but the reality, as they say, cannot be farther from the truth. This clumsily shot film centers around a main character, a pregnant lesbian woman, who loses her toddler when said toddler falls out a window. She then spirals downward into deepening insanity as she is determined to protect her unborn child from everything and everyone, and everyone, she thinks, is out to get her.

It sounds like a fair premise, but the way it is told is very poorly done. The story is dull, hold no rhythm, and makes no sense. There is no rhyme or reason to her thought process or actions; even insanity must give some kind of twisted reason, but in this movie there is none of that. It tries to go into a five minute introduction to perhaps some kind of supernatural deal with the devil, but without explanation or further study it becomes pointless and confuses the viewer.

As a horror movie, Lyle fails in a spectacular fashion. There are no scares, at all. There are no jump scares, no psychological thrill, and, perhaps worse of all, not even a single tense moment. The boring camera views and bleak colors do nothing to help this movie either.

I am sad I wasted my time viewing this during free time better spent on virtually anything else. I would not give a single dollar to their next movie if this is the best they have to show for their lazy, half-baked efforts.