ShadowMarsh (2022)

Directed by Matt Leal [Other horror films: Hacked (2020), Tales from the Grave: The Movie (2020, segment ‘What We Leave Behind’), Hacked 2 (2022)]

After reading the plot of this one and getting a feel for the characters, I really wanted to come out of it with the ability to recommend it to anyone. Unfortunately, while aspects of ShadowMarsh are decent, I can’t say that I’m not largely disappointed with this one, as much as that does sadden me to admit.

What I think the film really nails are the characters – there’s a young woman (Ellen Woomer) and her uncle (Mike Ferguson) moving back to a small town, in which the uncle reconnects with his friend the sheriff (Lew Temple), and the young woman reconnects with her friends (Corrinne Mica and Shani Drake), a lesbian couple. One of these women is the daughter of a mayor (Dave Sheridan) running for re-election, to add a little more flavor to the mix.

There’s not a ton of characters in the film, as you can see, but the characters they have are pretty fleshed out. True, Sheridan’s mayor is somewhat of a one-note character, at least up to a point (his prime concern is his re-election campaign, which he takes very seriously), but there’s some conversations between Ferguson and Temple that were quite touching, and Ferguson’s character also has an argument with Woomer’s character that hits some good notes also.

If the movie were a drama about trying to readjust to small town life and an old hometown, I think ShadowMarsh really could have worked. Where the movie really lets me down, though, are the horror and mystery aspects.

With the horror, it’s pretty clear to me that they did what they could. There’s a “demon of the dirt” that pops up for perhaps five seconds total of screen time throughout the whole film, and we never get a particularly good look at it. Most of the kills just show a splash of blood hitting trees. That type of thing happens at least four times throughout the film. We do see a body or two after death, and one is pretty gruesome, but insofar as the horror goes, it really struck me as weak.

That didn’t need to be a negative, though; if they had a bit more meat regarding the mystery of the small town, the mysterious killings by the demon, and the cult that summoned it, not to mention more about the many missing reports in the Forest Department, then any lack of explicit horror could have been excused. If we got a legit small town cult mystery, complete with some history of the town and cult thrown in, perhaps things wouldn’t feel so shallow. Aside from a few pieces either hinted at or shown toward the end, we don’t really get that type of thing, though.

Oh, and this may be a small thing, but there were a few scenes that seemed to be going for a light-hearted tone. The opening of the film, in fact, has an almost comedic scene with a cult. What’s odd about that is ShadowMarsh isn’t by any stretch a comedic movie – most of it is pretty dramatic, including the rather somber (if not disappointing) finale, and the scenes which veered toward humor just felt out-of-place tonally to me.

Little of this is the fault of the performances. Ellen Woomer does well as the lead, dealing with being uprooted from her life in Michigan and the death of her mother. Mike Ferguson (Amityville Uprising, Devilreaux, Amityville Hex, Moon of the Blood Beast) is strong as an uncle with a criminal history, and his friendship with the sheriff, played by Lew Temple (Halloween, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, The Devil’s Rejects) is among my favorite parts of the film.

I suspect more probably could have been done with Shani Drake and Corrinne Mica (Evil Everywhere), but in their limited roles, I think both were fine. Dave Sheridan (Blood Craft, The Special, Victor Crowley, Scary Movie) was mostly a one-note character, but got a hint of depth toward the finale, and Felissa Rose (mostly known for Sleepaway Camp, though has been in tons of horror films, many of them with Dave Sheridan) pops up too, though I don’t think she adds much.

Naturally, I was disappointed with this one. The finale had potential, and as I said, it was dramatic, but it also felt largely inconclusive. The horror aspects especially felt light, as blood splatter hitting trees was 95% of what they had going on. Certainly the highlights were the characters and potentially the atmosphere, along with the setting. I’m not sure where this was filmed, but I did think that the town and nearby forest looked good.

Overall, though, ShadowMarsh was indeed a disappointment. I don’t think it’s an awful movie, and certainly I believe that the film had some good potential, but I don’t think it got there. There are definitely worse things that someone could be watching, but that said, I believe this is a movie I’ll not soon be recommending to anyone.

5.5/10