A pretty, blond, impassive psychiatrist, Greenhouse, discovers that her inoperable brain tumor has begun to grow again. The only treatment is an experimental drug that has never been authorized for use in humans because it drove the mice crazy. Something like that. Out of desperation, Greenhouse begins to use it on herself, leading to some weird changes in her sensorium.
She returns home after examining her X rays, in which the tumor is helpful enough to have outlined itself with a broad white line, just in case she might have missed it. "Let's talk," she says to her amiable husband, Currie, an author working under a deadline. Not now, he tells her, because he has to retire to their dasha in the woods and get some work done.
He leaves. She thinks it over. The revelation of her tumor's newfound aggression is too important to wait, so she visits the cabin, where she finds him and her harmless teen-aged sister trying to get the facilities working.
The cabin is shortly invaded by two men, one of them an escaped patient whom Greenhouse had kept in isolation. There is a gun. There are a dozen attempted escapes. There is torture. There is a murder of a dog. There is reasoning and pleading, tears, anger.
The escaped patient, McFee, is now perfectly rational as he and his companion put the three hostages through various "games" that wind up in a blood bath and a suicide.
I didn't find it at all spooky, just tense and nasty in a familiar way, kind of like some marriages I know. The two invaders are products of Greenhouse's guilt for some unacceptable acts she has committed. At least I assume so. It gets a little twisted and confusing towards the end. Some of what is finally revealed is implausible.
It's a Canadian production and it shows. I don't mean the low production values, just the accents, the absence of skill in some of the performers, and the overall tonus of the thing. It's not the usual Lifetime Movie Network film though -- too many F bombs and a bit too much blood. With a bit of pruning it could easily have fit into that format. "Let's talk" is repeated three times. "We have to talk", once.
Without knowing why, I'm beginning to feel these things are really distasteful. Who wants to see people chopped up with an ax? Blood spattering all over the ax wielder? A similar situation in "Funny Games" has the invading murderers making jokes to the camera about their shenanigans. It's not funny at all but it's the kind of treatment these dumb movies deserve.
She returns home after examining her X rays, in which the tumor is helpful enough to have outlined itself with a broad white line, just in case she might have missed it. "Let's talk," she says to her amiable husband, Currie, an author working under a deadline. Not now, he tells her, because he has to retire to their dasha in the woods and get some work done.
He leaves. She thinks it over. The revelation of her tumor's newfound aggression is too important to wait, so she visits the cabin, where she finds him and her harmless teen-aged sister trying to get the facilities working.
The cabin is shortly invaded by two men, one of them an escaped patient whom Greenhouse had kept in isolation. There is a gun. There are a dozen attempted escapes. There is torture. There is a murder of a dog. There is reasoning and pleading, tears, anger.
The escaped patient, McFee, is now perfectly rational as he and his companion put the three hostages through various "games" that wind up in a blood bath and a suicide.
I didn't find it at all spooky, just tense and nasty in a familiar way, kind of like some marriages I know. The two invaders are products of Greenhouse's guilt for some unacceptable acts she has committed. At least I assume so. It gets a little twisted and confusing towards the end. Some of what is finally revealed is implausible.
It's a Canadian production and it shows. I don't mean the low production values, just the accents, the absence of skill in some of the performers, and the overall tonus of the thing. It's not the usual Lifetime Movie Network film though -- too many F bombs and a bit too much blood. With a bit of pruning it could easily have fit into that format. "Let's talk" is repeated three times. "We have to talk", once.
Without knowing why, I'm beginning to feel these things are really distasteful. Who wants to see people chopped up with an ax? Blood spattering all over the ax wielder? A similar situation in "Funny Games" has the invading murderers making jokes to the camera about their shenanigans. It's not funny at all but it's the kind of treatment these dumb movies deserve.