{"id":50646,"date":"2025-11-17T14:02:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T19:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=50646"},"modified":"2025-11-17T14:02:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T19:02:08","slug":"keeper-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2025\/11\/17\/keeper-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Keeper [2025]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Supernatural happenings disrupt a couple\u2019s vacation to a secluded cabin in Osgood Perkins\u2019 enigmatic Keeper.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

When does Osgood Perkins sleep?\u00a0 Thanks to a deal with Neon, it seems he\u2019s been working non-stop to provide his specific brand of cinematic strangeness to those who like their films a little weird and off-kilter.\u00a0 In the past 16 months, he\u2019s delivered the Lynchian serial-killer hunt of Longlegs<\/a>, the over-the-top Stephen King adaptation The Monkey<\/a>, and now Keeper. This all after the incredible Blackcoat\u2019s Daughter, Gretel & Hansel, and the Shirley Jacksonesque I am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House.<\/span><\/p>\n

Like all of his films, Keeper is a strange film. Yes, it\u2019s strange for how it\u2019s shot and presented. But more in the effect it’s had over the day and some since watching it. When it played and finished, I was thinking, \u201cI might have hated this, so nothing, what a waste.\u201d (Note, I love slow burns; a film merely taking its time is not boring.) I still would put Keeper as the least of his films, but I\u2019m appreciating it more now, 36 hours later than I did when I left the auditorium. Perhaps my disappointment in The Running Man seeped into my viewing, and that effect has worn off; maybe it needed a little bit to seep.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I think, on reflection, that Keeper is a film more about vibes than it is solid storytelling. It has a story to tell, surely, but the way Perkins tells it is an airy, untethered, question-filled, unfocused tale. It takes seeing the whole for it to come into focus and connect. But it\u2019s not just this that doesn\u2019t quite work, keeping the film from reaching the strength of his other works. Again, they are all esoteric, strange, and off-putting. But they feel more complete, engaging in the time of viewing with a footing as moved through, even as odd and flighty as they are.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Keeper is essentially a two-hander, maybe less, since for a large portion of time it\u2019s just Tatiana Maslany\u2019s Liz. She and her boyfriend, Rossif Sutherland\u2019s Malcolm, are celebrating their first anniversary by visiting his secluded cabin. Liz\u2019s friend (only heard on the phone, a portion of the isolation) thinks something’s up (good horror bestie, thanks), but Liz says it\u2019s fine and heads off anyway. It\u2019s not long before things get strange. Creepy cousin lives next door and stops in with a model. Malcolm insists she eats a cake left by the caretaker. She\u2019s seeing things, images of women from different times (a disconcerting opening shows them as well), hearing voices, and everything just is weird. Left alone for reasons, much of the film is Malasay alone, wandering about, having her visions and strange feelings.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Perkins does well, along with three-time collaborator cinematographer Jeremy Cox, in keeping the viewer off balance, uncomfortable, and somewhat between slightly and fully disturbed. The cabin is all windows and angles, of Lovecraftian geometry or perhaps Jackson\u2019s Hill House, as no angle is right. The woods loom with the feeling of watching, what is out there? Each specific sequence, outside of any context, works as a minor nightmare, unsettling and effective.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Perkins has often started down the Lynchian surrealism path, especially in Longlegs, but he goes further down in Keeper, but losing Lynch\u2019s substance for more style. Water overlays of Liz\u2019s dreams and zone outs could be pulled straight from Fire Walk With Me. I wish Perkins leaned more into the Lynchian surrealism, as it pulls away after a while, leaving a level of boredom in viewing that is frustrating while watching. Often, I was left with \u201csomething is happening here, but what is it, and do I care?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Maslany is great as Liz, returning for Perkins after her role in The Monkey (or the other way around, as The Monkey was filmed first). She\u2019s fantastic, selling someone who is often alone and quiet. Plays so much on her face. I realized while watching just how expressive she is. She has a face that looks different at just about every angle. I know she played a zillion roles in Orphan Black, and I can see it in how mutable she is from moving the camera a few inches. For a few moments, multiple times, I wasn\u2019t sure I was looking at her or one of the manifestations. She\u2019s paired with Rossif Sutehrland. It\u2019s awkward. He gives an annoyingly stilted performance. He takes the air out of the room every time he\u2019s present. And they have zero chemistry.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>It doesn\u2019t help that they are saddled with a bad script by Dangerous Animals’<\/a> Nick Lepard. Keeper is an example of a great idea and lacking execution. There\u2019s something telling at its core, when it all settles in after the nothingness; The ideas are there, but the dialogue is awful. Liz and Malcolm talk like people meeting for the first time. Part of my overall issues, especially while watching, is the meandering. Sure, as noted, each scene has a tension and brooding atmosphere. The idea behind it all isn\u2019t fleshed out consistently, with a lot in the air of whys and hows; where sequences exist to make a scare, but don\u2019t add up after. I get and support the overall themes, but discussing them delves far too deep into spoiler territory, as any level of talk gives away the film’s secrets. Sorry. But they are salient points, presented underwhelmingly.<\/span><\/p>\n

Keeper is an interesting film, led by a great performance by Tatiana Maslany. Looking at the whole, the picture is well-constructed but with big cracks. A shoddy script weakens well-shot and put-together sequences. Perkins is a fantastic visual director and has done well with his own scripts. Moving to someone else\u2019s trips up. Yet, I\u2019m here for what comes next.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Supernatural happenings disrupt a couple\u2019s vacation to a secluded cabin in Osgood Perkins\u2019 enigmatic Keeper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[302,477],"class_list":["post-50646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-drama","tag-horror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50646"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50646\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50651,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50646\/revisions\/50651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}