Movie Review: DARK WINDOWS

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: August 22nd, 2023 / 07:11 PM

DARK WINDOWS movie poster | ©2023 Brainstorm Media

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Anna Bullard, Annie Hamilton, Rory Alexander, Jóel Sæmundsson, Morten Holst, Rachel Fowler, Grace Binford Sheene, Vanessa Borgli
Writer: Wolf Kraft, story by Alex Herron
Director: Alex Herron
Distributor: Brainstorm Media
Release Date: August 18, 2023

DARK WINDOWS follows the contemporary slasher format faithfully. We have a group of teens (albeit fewer in numbers than usual) spending the weekend in a large, isolated site. They are stalked by a masked killer who is punishing and vengeful.

What elevates DARK WINDOWS within the subgenre is that it is uncommonly well-acted. Director Alex Herron, and screenwriter Wolf Kraft, working from Herron’s story, take the time to develop the characters and their individual reactions to a recent tragedy.

DARK WINDOWS opens with a scene of disturbance. We see scattered pills, a discarded knife, a memorial shrine with candles around a photo. Finally, we see a young woman, Tilly (Anna Bullard), holding a baseball bat. She calls the police on her cell and says someone has broken into the house. Then the call drops out and an intruder enters.

Cut to a few days earlier. Tilly is in the car with her mom (Rachel Fowler), unwillingly headed to a memorial service. We learn in short order that this is for Tilly’s lifelong best friend Ali (Grace Binford Sheene). Ali has just died in a car accident, which also involved Tilly and their other friends Monica (Annie Hamilton) and Peter (Rory Alexander).

Ali’s parents are so devastated they can barely function. Ali’s boyfriend Andrew and her uncle Bob are both furious.

Tilly is cowed and Peter is morose, but Monica is determined not to accept blame for the crash. She proposes that the three of them spend the weekend at her late grandparents’ house in the country.

The house is a huge, two-story rectangular affair, with windows at regular intervals. At first, the mood does start to lighten, but between Monica’s insistent lack of empathy, Peter’s alcohol-fueled numbness, and Tilly’s contemplative guilt, it’s hard for any of them to have a good time. And that’s before someone starts leaving the windows open, moves objects around, and they all hear their own voices and Ali’s, repeating what was said in the car.

This last is the most genuinely mysterious aspect of DARK WINDOWS. What the heck is going on here? The answer is perhaps not worthy of the buildup it gets, but it’s still reasonable.

As for the stalker’s identity, this is made into a bigger question than it ought to be. We know who the suspects are, and it’s hard to see how things would play out differently were one swapped out for another.

Still, director Herron makes good use of the space and the light. He and writer Kraft produce some effective jump scares, and one memorable kill.

More importantly, though, DARK WINDOWS has attributes of a straight drama. The car accident isn’t just a catalyst for the action, but a persuasive exploration of largely nonverbal reactions to mortality. Bullard is especially impactful, with an expressive face that registers a wide range of emotions.

Bullard’s performance actually sells the ending, where we feel the weight of a specific decision. DARK WINDOWS is still a teen slasher, but it cuts deeper than we might expect.

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