“And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul,” says the quote that opens this feature, promising to take us deep into the woods and test our psychological mettle. Written and directed by the capable hands of Teresa Sutherland (The Wind, Midnight Mass) we plunge into the wilderness for a mystic journey among the trees. Chronicling the time alone in the forest for a new park ranger, this film focuses on psychological and cosmic horror to keep you anxiously waiting on your toes. We open to a campground where a ranger, his back to us, is listening to the morning calls over the radio, scribbling something down and walking over to a sign at his post to hang a note of his own: “I owe this land a body,” his scratchy note reads as he disregards calls for his position. Night has fallen over the woods and mountains when we join Lennon (Georgina Campbell, Barbarian & T.I.M.) as she approaches Arvores National Park for her first day on the job the following day, hearing over the radio about disappearances happening in the area.
Morning brings some frosty introductions for Ranger Lennon, as the force is gossiping about the new hire and only her co-worker Jackson (Nick Blood) seems to be the handshaking type. As a meeting goes on about safety and work protocol, the lack of cell phone towers and electricity to the furthest watch points, Lennon is noticeably distant, distracted by a missing poster for a former ranger on the wall. They are given orders to leave only footprints, and with a packet of materials, the rangers disperse. Jackson and Lennon take a chopper to the furthest outreaches where the stations are placed, seeing as now that she has taken the coveted position of the ranger who left his post, leaving the ominous note prior. After spending the day cleaning and restocking as well as marking her map, we see that Lennon has another missing poster, for a Jenny Lennon, hung with a family photo.
A nightmare with a screaming girl and claustrophobic trees guides us into morning where radio checks are being performed, and Lennon has put up her own sign at the station saying she will be gone for three days. With nothing but rocky wilderness ahead, Lennon packs up and puts on a podcast that’s discussing missing persons in the wild and saying that the largest collection of missing persons cases is in Arvores National Park. The podcast continues to detail the missing persons cases, saying the rangers must be aware and the victims have been found with no shoes, the recording eventually turning into a cacophony of voices that finally goes silent as a radio check comes through. As she heads back, Lennon gets another unintelligible radio call and finds she has no extra batteries either: despite this, she continues her trek into nightfall. In the woods around her she begins to hear noises, discovering now she has no batteries in her radio at all before suddenly running into another ranger in the darkness. He offers her new batteries and a meal, and they both eat beside a waterfall. Conversation is slow as they talk about their love of the job, when the ranger asks why Lennon is there – as he would prefer to hear the real story rather than rumor. Without any answers volunteered, the two make camp and prepare for the next day.
The first thing you’ll notice, I believe, is the magnificent cinematography from Rui Poças and direction from Sutherland. Poças delivers beautiful shots of the natural wilderness so vivid you can smell the trees, and inverted, obscure or closeup shots which can be disorienting and dreamy. He takes us from night to day effortlessly, using the sun between the leaves or a single flashlight beam to illuminate what he wants you to see. Sutherland is masterful at creating tension that turns into pure magic, with sound design to leave you surrounded by birds and crickets or leave you stranded in a vacuum with nothing but distant crackling branches or the cries of a search party circling you, dazing you. Georgina Campbell is a genre gem and singular talent; she falls into the quiet, thoughtful role with ease and guides us though many scenes without dialogue with a steady hand and curious eyes. Her fervor for her job and for her search is apparent as the film continues and the nightmares start breaching daytime. She’s contemplative and thoughtful, guided into the woods by many reaching hands and a mysterious search only she seems to feel unwinding all around her, but she’s not immune to all the emotions and anxiety that a horror performance requires, experiencing illusion and delusion from herself and others, spiraling into terror. Supporting performances from Nick Blood and a brief but impactful set of scenes with superior ranger Zhang (Wai Ching Ho) round out the cast and make the most of their time in a mostly lonely story.
Visuals are stunning, blending effects and camera work to make the most of some shocking apparitions and symbols like the omnipresent black deer fading in and out of view, like shadow. Much like Night of the Missing, I felt guided by the missing posters and the interesting ideas that could explain why so many people go missing without a trace in a wilderness setting, even protected ones like National Parks. Sutherland uses isolation in more ways than one to create this sense of loneliness and longing for Lennon, drawing us into the ranger’s battle. Though it relies heavily on inference and imagery, Sutherland still manages to get her message across with some intriguing concepts about the thousands of missing people each year, leaving you to decide what from the many hazy and vague concepts presented could fit the story and its conclusion. Though it may be unsatisfactory that audiences are definitely left to their imaginations to give this any sense of closure, this is perhaps a feature of the cosmic aspects of this film, leaving us with a sense of unknowing. A visually striking debut, Sutherland has uncovered a story worth telling among the trees, even if sometimes it’s up to you to take the pieces presented and put them together. A heady, dreamy, sojourn into psychological horror, Lovely, Dark, and Deep is a film worthy of nightmares and daydreams.
Lovely, Dark, and Deep (2023) is out today – 22nd February 2024 – on XYZ Films.