SOLSTICE

US, 2008, 92 minutes. Colour.
Elisabeth Harnois, Shawn Ashmore, Hilarie Burton, Amanda Seyfried, Tyler Hoechlin, Matt O’ Leary, R. Lee Ermey.
Directed by Daniel Myrick.

Solstice has been directed by one of the directors of The Blair Witch Project. A lot of the action in this film takes place in the woods.

The film relies on a mythology of the summer solstice, St John’s Eve (near to the eve of the feast of St John the Baptist). The film’s screenplay indicates that the dead communicate with people at this particular time.

The film focuses on Megan, whose twin sister Sophie has killed herself some months before. She is persuaded to go for her annual holiday with her friends. She encounters Nick (Tyler Hoechlin) at the store, who talks about the mythologies of St John’s Eve.

Megan feels that her sister is communicating with her, the friends are sceptical though act as if the possibility was there. They have an encounter with a local farmer, Leonard (R. Lee Ermey) whose granddaughter died mysteriously and whose body has never been found.

The film is conventional enough, young adults going to a lake for a holiday. However, in the last twenty minutes or so there is some kind of innovation – Megan having communication from her sister, knowing where the grave of the little girl is, digging it up, having one of her friends, Christian (Shawn Ashmore) who was her twin sister’s boyfriend revealing that the girl’s death was the result of a hit-run accident. He and the twin buried the girl and the twin, remorseful, killed herself.

1. The popularity of this kind of horror film? The touch of the supernatural? Young people on a holiday?

2. The Louisiana locations, the house, the woods? A sense of realism?

3. The mythology of St John’s Eve, the summer solstice? The magazine and the information about the dead communicating? The background of Louisiana voodoo? Megan and her belief? The others and their scepticism, belief?

4. Sophie killing herself, her parents at the grave, Megan and her grief? Megan going on the holiday? Her friends? The shop, meeting Nick, the magazine, her interest in Nick? Her personality, her grief for her sister?

5. The members of the group: Christian, Sophie’s boyfriend, the flashbacks to the party sequences? His presence in the group? The sudden revelation of the truth at the end? Alicia, the town girl, going along for the ride? Mark, his drinking, pouring the wine over Alicia, drinking and his faux pas? Zoe, lively, Megan’s friend, supportive?

6. Leonard, suddenly on the road? The story about his granddaughter? His sinister behaviour?

7. Nick and his coming to the group, some resentment, the hooch? His supporting Megan? Helping her at the grave?

8. Megan and her transformation, going to the woods, finding the grave, digging? The reaction of the others? Mark and the gun? Christian and his going through the woods, confronting Megan? The truth?

9. The police, Christian and his running into the car? The ambulance? Christian taken to hospital? Leonard and his acknowledgment to Megan what had happened?

10. Megan and Nick, her return to the house, putting the bear and the key ring at Leonard’s door? The prospect of Nick coming to study in the city? Friendship?

11. An average horror movie – for its target audience?