Summary

• Ashley Judd plays a tough woman protecting her nieces from a dangerous world, raising them in seclusion until an outsider threatens their sanctuary.
• The eerie production design adds style to the film, and the forest setting is used well.
• Contrived plot points detracts from the film's believability, stretching common sense.

A fierce woman protects her nieces on a remote homestead in the aftermath of an apocalyptic virus. Lazareth takes an intimate and nuanced view of the worst-case scenario with moderate success. The characters' seclusion forces a reckoning when outsiders interrupt a carefully crafted isolation. How do you react to strangers when curiosity and lust overcomes fear? The pieces don't quite fit together from a common sense and believability standpoint, but the human drama central to the narrative is fascinating to behold. Willing suspension of disbelief goes a long way here.

Lee (Ashley Judd) stands by her backdoor window holding a shotgun. She warns a desperate woman (Christine Uhebe) in the backyard not to come any closer. The stranger begs for food. Lee's young nieces (Paulina Patino, Sophia Baaden) hide under a table wearing respirators. The woman begins to scratch herself uncontrollably. Lee screams that she has the virus.

A decade later, Maeve (Sarah Pidgeon) and Imogen (Katie Douglas), her younger sister, have settled into a routine with their aunt, but Maeve has a growing curiosity — how bad are things outside their property? Lee dismisses her question with the usual warnings of rampaging rapists and marauders. She reminds the girls that their home is everything. They must protect its secrecy at all costs. Maeve searches the forest for edibles the following morning. She hides when a wounded man (Asher Angel) stumbles toward a makeshift tent. Maeve races back with Imogen. She's stunned when her eager sister says they must try to help him.

Protect Secrecy

Lazareth establishes key maturity differences between Maeve and Imogen within minutes of the first act. Maeve takes her aunt's rules seriously, but has a gnawing interest in what's happening around them. What does Lee actually encounter when she goes looking for supplies? Imogen is content with her surroundings but bored with Maeve and her aunt. She sees them both as authority figures. Imogen doesn't register a hurt man as a threat. His physical presence intoxicates her in a way she'd never been able to express. Imogen's sexual desires were never dormant. Her longings lived in fantasy and the theoretical until the introduction of a viable partner.

Writer/director Alec Tibaldi (Spiral Farm, The Daphne Project) lights a fuse that cannot be extinguished. Lee raised her nieces with a cult-like devotion to their sanctuary, but she also trained them to be supremely capable and equal partners in all decisions. This ingrained fortitude opens a Pandora's box of how to handle the interloper. He's another mouth to feed with dangerous baggage.

The people who injured him aren't going to stop looking, either. Lee's also keenly aware of Imogen's carnal awakening and Maeve's desire for greater understanding. They can no longer remain sheltered from the outside world. What are they each willing to sacrifice to accomplish individual goals?

Friend or Foe?

The forest feels like an impenetrable barrier shrouded in fog. Almost all the action takes place in and around the immediate house. The characters conserve resources by using candles and lamps. This focuses the camera on their faces with dimly lit backgrounds. Lee's stern demeanor, Maeve's angry resilience, and Imogen's provocative flirting have more dramatic heft that way. Lazareth gets style points for an eerie production design and a clever lighting scheme that sells the settings.

The film does fall prey to convenient progression when the story has to take obviously sinister turns. The bad guys are laughably the worst hide-and-seek players of all time. Tibaldi wants to build to a climax on his own terms. It becomes contrived because killers would open every door to find a victim. The characters conceal themselves in ways that just aren't credible. This is a sizable flaw in the plot's execution. Tibaldi resorts to bated breath gimmicks that make no sense at all.

Pidgeon and Douglas have good chemistry as very different sisters, but they have a staggering height difference and look nothing alike. Pidgeon towers at 5′ 10″ while Douglas is a petite 5′ 0″. Filmmakers usually shoot from a forced perspective to try and mitigate this visual imbalance. It's peculiar to say the least, but not necessarily a negative. Their performances are sound and entirely effective.

Lazareth is a production of The Syndicate, Three Point Capital (TPC), The Barnum Picture Company, and Vertical. It will be available in select theaters and VOD on May 10th from Vertical. You can watch the trailer below.