Slash from Guns N’ Roses is one of the producers of this throwback low-budget Canadian horror – and he makes his presence felt on the opening credits with a track that is the cinematic equivalent of playing a screeching guitar solo outside your Glastonbury tent at 6am. Subtle it is not. But possibly spot on for a movie that feels like a blast of 80s nostalgia, paying homage to the era’s nastily effective cheap scary movies.
It begins like a Stephen King novel, in the sleepy town of Lone Crow, where a badly mutilated body drifts in on a canoe. “Where’d the bones go?” marvels sheriff John Hawkins (Allan Hawco), who is days away from a promotion and upping sticks to the big smoke. A driving licence identifies the corpse as Dr Cole Parsons, a particle physicist who’s been living in a remote house upriver carrying out secretive research. The sheriff heads out to investigate, with a local guide Meg (Emily Alatalo) and the town’s sleazebag coroner Jacob (Wesley French).
Some performances are less awkward than others – or perhaps some actors have more to work with. All that’s required from Alatalo is to look proficient with a rifle and roll her eyes at slimy Jacob. Hawco fares better as Hawkins, who discovers that the dead physicist Dr Parsons is known to police. His wife was recently committed to a psychiatric hospital, convinced that her husband’s research caused the disappearance of their daughter.
No surprise that Dr Parsons’ cabin in the woods turns out to be creepy as hell. And from here it all goes a bit freakish with some cosmic alternate dimensions stuff right out of HP Lovecraft. Which leads to some juicily gruesome moments – somewhat ruined by the implausibility of a plot development involving someone guessing Dr Parsons’ computer password in three tries. He’s a particle physicist for heaven’s sake.
• The Breach is released on 10 July on digital platforms.
