Horror Movie Review: Beware the Lake (2017)

You know, if you’re going to make a lake the focal point of your title, you should probably make it the focal point of your movie. Instead of just hinting at some possible supernatural powers. Beware the Lake? More like Beware the Murdered Girl Whose Body Is Dumped in the Lake Who Has Witchcraft in Her Ancestry! A far less snappy, but at least, accurate title.

Directed by Elgin Cahill Elgin, who co-wrote it with Wendy Winterbourne, Beware the Lake stars Jonathan Lipnicki, Anja Knebl, Ava Dalgaard and JP Dayton.

Tabitha is the new girl in town and immediately catches the eye of brothers, Max and Mason. The older of the two, Mason is a bit of football legend, and the younger, Max is the popular kid in school. He hangs with the cheerleaders, with the lead Blair, taking an instant dislike to Tabitha. Partially because she looks different, partially because she becomes friends with Max and Mason. The latter being someone Blair would very much like to hook up with.

She and the rest of the cheerleading squad decide to play a prank on her, one that goes severely awry. They invite her to late night drinks and a swim at a local lake. First, they spike her drink and then when she’s stripped down, take her clothes, and drive away. That’s a pretty bad thing to do but Blair takes it several steps further. Calling up two local creeps and telling them about Tabitha and that she ‘likes to party’.

The creeps head out and find her freezing cold and disorientated from the drugs in the drink. So, what do scumbags do in a situation like this? Try to rape her, and when she fights back, strangle her and dumb her body in the lake.

So, what’s special about this lake? Well, the film’s opening suggests it might have the power to raise the dead. However, the film also suggest that it is related to Tabitha’s ancestry, highlighted by the moment her aunt curses Max, who was not involved anyway. It’s unnecessarily confusing, made worse by Tabitha’s ghostly return and choice of targets.

Here’s the important thing though, Beware the Lake is not a bad movie. It’s not a great movie either but it does enough to hold the attention even if it fails to stick the landing with its rushed ending.

The cast are decent; Anja Knebl is very likable as Tabitha and Ava Dalgaard is good as the bitchy head cheerleader, Blair. Their rivalry needed more oomph to make the events that occur more believable but they’re still very watchable. Likewise, the relationship angle between Max and Tabitha is half-baked, the film quickly changing directions to suggest that her and Mason might have more going on. Then the latter promptly disappears from the film completely.

The film could have done with a bit more gore too as most of the deaths amount to little more than strangulation. Yet, there are also moments of imagination. Such as when ghost Tabitha is attacking one of the minion cheerleaders and we get a brief scene of her almost drowning in her bed. Implying that when Tabitha gets hold of you, it’s like she’s pulling you under the water. More of this and less of Tabitha standing by a door, shivering in the cold would have benefited things.

As would have a more focused story, easily the movie’s biggest flaw and one many may struggle to look past.