Comments on: The Lodge Film Investigated and Explained

By: Chris T.

Chris T. — Tue, 30 Jun 2020 02:20:13 +0000

Besides the fact that this film confused the crap out of me, and left me irked at the end… I have a few questions.
(1) Grace’s bloody nose at the beginning (and then recurring deeper into the film)… I assume they show this for a reason. Is it symbolism of some kind? What’s the literal meaning? Does the act of cult deprogramming somehow weaken the nasal mucosa? Maybe I’m missing the obvious?
(2) The man (father), Richard Hall….. I’m curious, what his job, his occupation? Is he a doctor, like a Phd or MD shrink? I remember they said he wrote about Grace in his book. It didn’t feel to me like he was just an author, when they said he was called back to ‘work’ for several days (through Christmas no less). I assumed he’s a shrink who maybe helped Grace via therapy to where she is now (recovery-wise). But if so, why was Grace hiding the pills she was taking from Richard when he came into her ‘lodge’ bedroom?
(3) If I’m right about Richard above, then he’s bad guy #1. You don’t date your patient. You don’t leave your wife for a deeply fragile younger, sole cult survivor. You don’t lie (he lied several times, but one of the first was saying to Laura that Grace was not there). You don’t leave your kids with a stranger while you work through Christmas. Also, anyone notice that Richard has no tangible emotional affect at all? When he sees the frozen dog Grady, he doesn’t reall have any actual reaction at all. The guy is a total piece of crud.
And bad guys #2 and 3 are those kids – who were pretty much planning a murder (as far as their puny brains could fathom the results of their actions). If I’m to actually accept they could possible concoct such an evil scheme, then these kids are BAD, as in… EVIL. So as the very end comes, I’m realizing I can’t really fault Grace. She’s been forced into the role of redeemer. Not sure if the cult connection really matters anymore. Rather, she takes out bad guy #1, and then bad guys #2 and #3.
And then I realize I’ve watched a film that smells like David Fincher had recently walked through the set!

By: Lisa

Lisa — Tue, 26 May 2020 12:19:13 +0000

I just want to also comment on the religious aspect of this movie which I also felt was a bit gratuitous at times but I get why they put it in to further certain aspects of the plot like Grace being disturbed over the religious items at the lodge. I don’t think the Catholic religion was really taking a beating because the cult Grace belonged to was clearly some kind of super extremist Christian. Cults and extremes in any religion are bad. Catholicism wasn’t really the enemy here. Just as a note, I’m a lapsed Catholic. Received all my Sacraments but was displeased with how my parish was run at the time. I still follow many of the traditions and worship in my own way. Anyway, it appeared that mom was the religious one in this film and not an extremist but rather devout which was why Mia was so upset that she believed that mom could not get to heaven after committing suicide. I guess it’s also why the priest says during the funeral that he hopes she gets where she needs to go instead of stating she went to heaven. I guess some could perceive this film as anti religion but I think it’s more anti extremist religion like suicide cults or rather the impact of that kind of extremism on an already fragile mind.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Tue, 26 May 2020 12:03:32 +0000

As usual, I agree with just about everything deKev said with the exception of the kids. Those kids hated her, sure, but it takes extra strength evil to torture a woman already so close to the edge and kill an innocent animal. Yes, the clues were there when they researched her but who knew they would go that far? I was absolutely convinced it was Grace in some kind of stupor. I was also convinced she killed the kids and was just talking to some kind of delusion. As a side bar, the kid who plays Aiden is also in a show on Apple TV right now called Defending Jacob which is fantastic. Anyway, like you, Taylor, my heart popped out of my chest when mom took out a gun and blew her head off as I really knew nothing of this film before I watched it. It just goes to show that you do not need any supernatural elements for a film to truly be disturbing. Just a fragile mind and and a catalyst to break it even more. I mean, I definitely think the father is also to blame because 6 months is hardly enough time after mom blows her head off because of the divorce to put the catalyst for her suicide locked in a house with the kids. He definitely wasn’t winning father of the year here! As for the end, I guess we will never know which way it goes. She already thought they were all dead and that she didn’t really kill dad so I guess it could go either way. I agree she could never be convicted, though. Between what the kids did and her history she would just get a life long stay in the mental hospital.

By: Yve

Yve — Mon, 18 May 2020 02:14:37 +0000

Frankly, I found a lot of this film implausible on a plot level. It’s not clear what Richard finds so attractive about Grace or what the issues in his failed marriage were. What father leaves his children alone with his fiancée in a situation like this, especially after his son has expressed the belief that the woman is a psychopath? Why would they not remove the signs of Laura’s presence from the lodge in advance, especially if Richard is not a devout Catholic? Why would he leave an inexperienced woman alone in a winter setting like that? Why would he maroon her without a car? Why would he explain to her how to use the handgun? Why does he even have a handgun (this is Canada after all)? Why would he be so cavalier in staying in touch, since his family is incommunicado for what looks like at least two days before he decides he needs to go there? Why was he looking at his daughter’s dollhouse and why was that the final motivation to rescue them? Why would anyone get that close to a handgun if he didn’t know exactly how it was loaded? But I assume we’re just supposed to suspend our disbelief on this issue. Unfortunately for me, plausibility is a huge issue in evaluating any narrative so I found this film less suspenseful than I had anticipated.
But the real issue that the script doesn’t deal with adequately is that it’s a story with no villain. We get the idea that Richard is a bit callous or clueless. I’d even go so far as self-centered or focused on his own needs. But he’s not in the film long enough, or in scenes with sufficient emotional intensity, to suggest that he’s truly malicious. On the one hand, his decisions set what appears to be the main problem of the plot in motion; on the other, it’s hard to discern any motivation at all beyond the superficial in everything he causes to have happen. When he gets it in the end, it’s impossible to feel anything at all (sadness or relief) as the character is such a nothing.
So the only villain in the film is the one in Grace’s mind — her religious past and her growing inability to distinguish between reality and delusion. But one reason the script failed in my estimation was that its religious framework was more or less pro forma and not believable for me (I thought this was weird just because I thought I read or heard in one of the interviews that the directors were atheists or wanted to say something about religion). Admittedly I’ve had this issue before when resentful atheists write film scripts about the Church. Here it once again was hard on the plot. The film more or less passes over Laura’s suicide without much comment — although this would be a serious problem for a devoutly Catholic family. The issue is pushed onto Mia’s worries about Purgatory, but it’s unclear what she believes about the teaching — and the few indications in the script tend to suggest that she views it in a way that’s no longer the standard for Catholic teaching in the twenty-first century. Since the 60s and then the 90s, the Church has backed aware from severe teachings about the ultimate fate of suicides. In any case, in the context of contemporary Catholic theology as disseminated in North America, it’s unlikely that such a young girl would be preoccupied with specifically this problem. Mia reads theologically like a character from 1957 or so. And the sprinkling of religious imagery (crucifixes, the Virgin) seemed arbitrary rather than meaningful. And what was the relationship of Aidan and Richard to Catholicism? Not touched upon in the least. It’s important in terms of how family allegiances might be playing out.

Equally problematic is the implication that Grace’s problems also stem from questions about Purgatory in relationship to her past history, just because Catholic suicide cults are extremely rare. One reason is probably the historic teaching of the Church, which was so unsympathetic to suicides. There just are comparatively few Catholic cults, because the administration of the Church is so strong (and because of the weight of the teaching for centuries extra ecclesiam nulla salus). So most Christian religious cults tend to be Protestant and Purgatory is a non-issue in the vast majority of Protestant Churches. The scrap of the sermon we hear from Grace’s father bears no relationship either to Catholicism or Christianity. And nothing about what we learn about the cult in the film suggests that it’s Catholic, so it’s unclear why Grace would focus on Purgatory as part of the issue that necessitates killing the unrepentant (and apparently unreligious) Richard. So I get why Grace would be preoccupied with her past and maybe with sin, but Purgatory was a silly red herring. As was the recurrence of the image of the Virgin. (Incidentally, “Mary reading” or “Mary with a book” is a frequent medieval and early modern motif and usually the book refers to Jesus, the logos of the Gospel according to John.) Why the Virgin? Why this image? What did it mean to the family? What did it mean to Grace? The film doesn’t give us a clue.

So why should we care? Well, if neither Richard nor Aidan is the villain and Grace is the victim of her delusions, understanding both the delusions and why the children are hostile to Grace would seem pretty essential to creating tension in the movie, and neither of those things happens. For me, the main message of the film on the religious level was “there are some people who are overly preoccupied with religion and it fills their lives with delusion.”

By: Nancyme

Nancyme — Sat, 16 May 2020 20:08:56 +0000

There would’ve been something wrong with those kids before the suicidal death of the mother..pushed toooo far, Grace was. Why did dog just lay in bed any time during movie? Sure loved the dog, not so much I gather. I like what was said, (not quoted) sin is sin, not one sin is worse than another, only that way to us, not God. His ways not our ways. God knows all and He foresees a suicide also. He is merciful. Hurting people, His people, God Is not a monster, now, the god of this world is. Catholic religion, a crock of control. Ex Catholic here. Religion, humbug! God, Great. Movie was ok though, sad that they blamed her for mom, dad was more responsible. Any theory works for me. She was pretty damaged by the time kids tried to set things right. They don’t punish young kids for life in jail, some should be but not many are.

By: Nancy Mescon

Nancy Mescon — Sat, 16 May 2020 15:16:43 +0000

I submitted a response fir the film the lodge but I do not see it on page. Please confirm if you received my response.

By: Nancy Mescon

Nancy Mescon — Sat, 16 May 2020 15:03:07 +0000

Hi Taylor. Just watched the Lodge. I normally don’t see what’s coming when I watch movies. But this film was pretty easy to predict. And I was really hoping this film would take off seeing that the film was made by the same folks that gave us “Goodnight Mommy.” Have you seen this film? Anyway, what bothered me about the Lodge was the predictably. Once I saw the dog in her arms, you knew what was going to happen. Once you see the kids on computer looking up Grace, I knew they were going to do something to her. When she wakes up and everything is gone from the Lodge, of course it was the kids! Duh! And any average person would have gone apes#&t on those kids! Also, no dog of mine would have been put in a dog bed in a strange house! You sleep with the dog! And with two kids in the house that don’t like you? Come on! That dog would be attached to my hip! I really hated the dollhouse stuff. “Hereditary” film much!! So I guess Grace was so fragile that she couldn’t empower herself to see how the kids were playing her? Come on! I think she kills the kids then herself in the end. Overall I was disappointed. I was expecting so much more for these filmmakers. Watch “Goodnight Mommy” instead.

By: Henry

Henry — Sun, 10 May 2020 15:59:07 +0000

Either theory seems plausible. But either way, the entire situation is 100 percent Richard’s fault.

Agreed that the acting performances by Martell and McHugh are great.

By: Taylor Holmes

Taylor Holmes — Sat, 02 May 2020 02:52:22 +0000

In reply to deKev.

Kudos –
lots of things in this comment deKev, that I skipped over.

The one thing that you didn’t comment on that really really drove me crazy after the fact, was the walking in a circle. Grace heads out – meets her dad, stumbles around, and eventually arrives back where she started. (Which, I said I’d get back to, yet never did. I must have slapdashed this thing together. Sorry guys.) Anyway, think about it, at the time, we are under the misimpression that they are in purgatory. Like 100% – for sure, without a doubt – they are in same Dante’s Inferno craziness. I mean, we had just watched Aidan kill himself and what? He’s alive? But after the fact, we know – (or we think we know – wait?!? are they actually in hell??!?) that the kids are punking the mom to be. So, with that said, someone explain to me how they remote controlled her back to the house? Or, AH! Hey, were they hoping that she would go ‘mad’, stumble into the snow, just like the dog, and die? So they didn’t expect her to come back. Ah. That’s it. That’s what they were doing. Even so, the weakest element of the plot was when she ‘miraculously’ arrives back at the house. I was like, DEFINITELY DEAD. Remember the movie The Fare? Loop loop loop. Or Triangle. Loop loop loop. Dead. (Sorry for the spoilers. Just being emotive.) So yeah, that really frustrated me after the fact. But realizing that they didn’t want her to come back, and it was just really bad luck that she did, definitely makes a lot more sense to me now.

And that Doll House placement! I kept waiting for what’s her name – Laura – to manifest like in The Ghost, fullon sheet and everything. I was so very very shocked that she didn’t make it into the movie really at all. I mean. Didn’t Rolling Stone do an expo enterview for her and this movie? Someone big did anyway. I mean, SHE WASNT EVEN IN IT. Granted, that was the single greatest film suicide I’ve ever witnessed. By long long long shot. It was so startling. And I expected her to come through the doll, the house, (what was that movie where the guy locked his imaginary friend in a doll house? Was it Kevin Isn’t Real? Something like that.) somehow, someway. But we continue on and the movie is literally just the kids and the Elvis Granddaughter. It was well played.

To have the movie flip on its head from the normal ‘daughter of a mass murder’ trope well trod path was really well played. I was certain that A) it would be Laura, back from the dead, jacking with them (ala Personal Shopper sort of vibe) or B) that it was Grace that had snapped. I gave literally zero-synapse firing to the possibility that it might have been the kids. None. So kudos to Mr. Midnight Special for pulling that acting off. Because it began and ended with the kids’ acting capabilities. For sure. So that aspect of it was huge for me.

And as for that Chekhov Gun… ENDING with the last shot being a Chekhov’s Gun, basically breaks the principle, except that it doesn’t. It is promising us what is about to happen. That they are both going to die. Heck, all three, are going to die. Which, is interesting in and of itself.

But I have to stop there – I need to finish watching The Captain. Oh my gosh, that is such a fun movie so far. Can’t wait to see how it ends. But great job deKev, your comment definitely outstripped my entire review. Might just delete your comment, abscond with the text and embed it somewhere in the middle, inelegantly as possible. Because that’s how I roll. Thanks chief.

And Aaron – sorry for the darkness. I’ll find you a chipper movie here soon. Wait, hold on, have I EVER reviewed a single ‘chipper’ movie? I mean, other than a wood chipper movie that is. No. No I haven’t. Not one. hahahha.