What is it that Robert Frost wrote in his poem “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening,” something about the woods being “lovely, dark, and deep?” In the case of Woodland Grey, the woods are dark and deep, but certainly not lovely. Instead, they offer a surreal and horrifying experience for two characters who can’t find a way out.

In Adam Reider’s feature, Ryan Blakely plays William, a man totally cut off from civilization. His main source of sustenance is a nearby river. Evenually, he finds an unconcious Emily (Jenny Raven), who tripped and bumped her head on a rock. After tending to her for a short while, he decides to help her return to civilization. The problem is that it’s not so easy. An unexplained force keeps them there. Meanwhile, Emily gets on William’s nerves by constantly asking him questions and trying to know him. William isn’t a man of many words and would rather be left alone to deal with his own demons. Raven and Blakely play off of each other quite well. Even if William is a cranky hermit, he does show moments of being more human than some mute mountain man.

The woods become an all-consuming force, especially once Emily discovers something strange, unusual, and perhaps sinister lurking in a shed behind William’s run-down trailer. It’s never quite clear what exactly lives in the shed and why William keeps it locked up. It appears in the form of a little girl (Chelsea Goldwater) and later something else entirely. The script, penned by Reider and Jesse Toufexis, offers far, far more questions than answers, especially once the climax hits. This is a film that contains looping, sparse flashbacks, and no clear narrative. It’s not a movie to put on in the background. It really demands a viewer’s full attention, and even then, there are a lot of guesses as to the ending. It’s likely an audience will have different conclusions.

Yet, there’s something surprisingly arresting about Woodland Grey, even if the last 20 minutes or so will frustrate some viewers. The cinematography is chilling, as is the sound design. You get a sense that William and Emily are never going to leave those woods, even if it’s unclear what’s trapping them. The forest feels totally ominous and foreboding. This is a film to watch as we head into the winter months. It’s eerie and tense, and those Canadian woods just feel cold and bleak.

While Woodland Grey is a slow burn for the majority of its runtime, it has several images that no viewer is likely to forget, especially once it blasts off into some pretty surreal territory. This is an atmospheric ride, one where narrative rules don’t really apply.  At times, the film feels like an art school project, but during its best moments, it contains a totally engrossing and entrapping atmosphere and some pretty startling images. Give Woodland Grey a watch on a cold winter night. This is the perfect time of year for this type of folk horror.

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