A little girl supposedly drowns in the lake during a family camping trip near her family home, grabbed by the monster she’s been having nightmares of. Twenty-five years later and the family is mostly in shambles. The father has passed away, the mother (Dee fuckin’ Wallace) doesn’t believe her daughter is dead and doesn’t seem capable of much beyond blankly watching television all day and grieving, her oldest brother Lucas is a drug addict who blames himself for his sister’s death and is a distant father to his daughter Zoey. Her other brother Jack is the only family member who seems to be doing ok, with a job at a closing theater and a girlfriend but he’s still dealing with a shit-ton of family baggage. The family still celebrates the dead sister’s eighth birthday and it’s as awkward as one would imagine. Whatever the hell the supernatural creature is starts eating away at the family’s mental state and Jack begins to suspect Zoey may be in danger. When the family goes back to the lake to spread some ashes, the creature shows itself and now nobody in the family can claim it doesn’t exist. There’s a whole bunch of trauma on display mixed in with the mental illness which fits well with the whole metaphors and monsters angle they’re playing. It’s a solid enough idea just lost in an execution that takes itself way too fucking serious and then fumbles any good grace it’s received as it crawls up its own ass in route to its jumbled climax. Michael fuckin’ Paré shows up as Jack’s uncle who is trying desperately to help the family and Angie Téodora Dick, who stole my heart in Planet of the Sharks, graces us with her presence as Jack’s sweet girlfriend (no Creole accent, unfortunately).
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