Starring: Tara Nchol Caldwell, Joshua Malekos, Ann Marie Gideon, Andrew Diego, Danielle Octavien, Deborah Tucker, and Pete Davis
Director: Niko Volonakis
Rating: Six of Ten Stars
After being swept off her feet by the handsome and romantic Johnny (Malekos), Tara (Caldwell) moves with him to a small, isolated town and the large mansion he owns there. As Tara learns more about the town and the former owner of the house, she comes to realize that a serial killer who is supposed to have died years ago is once again becoming active... and that she and Johnny might be in his sights.
"Lyvia's House" is a film that I found it difficult to assign a rating to. There were many things about it that I loved, and almost as many things about it that I disliked. In the end, though, I feel like the good outweighs the bad in this modern-day horror thriller with strong gothic romance overtones, making it a solid Six on my 0-10 scale. I also think that it's worth your time to check out if you enjoy slow-boil mystery stories with heaps of gothic flavoring.
In the good column, is the fact that "Lyvia's House" is a gorgeous and expertly executed film. On a visual level, every scene is perfectly framed and lighting is used effectively to deepen suspense, mystery, and horror. Although the story is slow in unfolding, the visuals are so well done that the viewer is still drawn in and is focused on following Tara's dangerous path along with her.
In fact, I can't even level my oft-made complaint about scenes being underlit here, because the job done by the crew was perfect in pretty much every way--perhaps it helped that the director was also a camera operator and the cinematographer also served as the gaffer. This is the first feature length production that Cody Martin worked as cinematographer on, and he did such an amazing job that I hope he has a brilliant career ahead of him.
Speaking of contributors to this film for whom this is a first, "Lyvia's House" marks the feature film debut of Tara Nichol Caldwell. Actually, it marks her professional acting debut, period, but you wouldn't know it from the great performance she gives. She is the lead actor in this film however you want to define that, and I hope I'll have a chance to see her in other films. (One of the signs of her great skill is that she has some truly terrible, borderline unintentionally funny lines, but her delivery and physical performance makes them work.)
Unfortunately, I can't give that sort of praise to Caldwell's co-star, Joshua Malekos. He gives a performance that is almost completely flat and monotone. Sometimes, it felt to me like he was just reading lines with the expectation that a voice actor would come in and an actual performance would be delivered during post-production. I suspect that he was going to something in between charming and mysterious, but it ended up just seeming empty. Even as the film enters into its riveting third act--where secrets are exposed, masks slip, and the film goes into full gothic horror mode--Malekos is something of a dead spot.
Even with Malekos's lackluster performance, I liked many other aspects of this film so much that I might have given it a Seven... if not for certain weaknesses in the script. I've already touched upon some of the dialogue being laughably bad, but even worse are the pointless scenes involving phone calls with Tara's best friend that serve little purpose other than to break the mounting suspense as the story unfolds. Even worse are the moments when characters fail to comment to things that are painfully obvious and SHOULD be something they'd remark upon (or at least worry about).
The most glaring of these is when Tara sees the self-portrait painted by Lyvia, the former owner of Johnny's house. Lyvia looks so much like Tara that it looks like Tara might have sat for the portrait. It's something that she (or SOMEONE) should have commented on; if Tara didn't notice that she could be Lyvia's twin sister, certainly someone in the village would have and made some comment.
I could go on and get increasingly nitpicky, but, as I said above, the good outweighs the bad in "Lydia's House". Despite its flaws, it is an engaging film that will add value to your Amazon Prime and/or Hulu subscriptions when it debuts on those and other platforms on October 1, 2024. (It's a pretty good way to kick off the creepy Halloween Season, I feel!)
Check out this preview of the film:
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