Autumn Road – Bleak Filled Horror
Director: Riley Cusick
Writer: Riley Cusick (Screenplay)
Starring: Lorelei Linklater, Riley Cusick, Justin Meeks, Lar Park-Lincoln, Goerge Welder, Maddy-Lea Hendrix
Plot: Twin brothers running a haunted house and an aspiring actress are all affected by the disappearance of a young girl.
Runtime: 1 Hour 35 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: Autumn Road starts as a childhood incident see twin brothers Charlie and Vincent grow up differently, with Vincent becoming the showman creating the haunted house, while Charlie runs the behind-the-scenes side of the show.
When the younger sister of a childhood friend Laura (Linklater) returns to the hometown, she gets to learn more about her sister Winnie who disappeared when they were all younger, as she starts to hang around with the twins, getting close to Charlie, as Vincent shows a darker side to his personality.
Thoughts on Autumn Road
Characters & Performances – Laura is an aspiring actress that has been through a tragic moment, seeing her look to walk away from this dream for a while, returning to her hometown where her sister disappeared years before. She has always wanted to know more about what caused her sister to disappear and as she gets close to her old friends Charlie & Vincent, she starts to learn more about the answers. Lorelei Linklater does bring us a character that has been feeling broken because of tragedy, someone who is looking for a friend, while feeling just as distant from most people in the world. Charlie is one of the twins, he runs the operation from behind the scenes, being the more friendly of the two, while being the one that saw Laura’s sister last, he is the one that will offer her friendship in their time of needs. Vincent is the showman for the haunted house, he has a darker side, which will see him commit random acts of violence away from the house, letting his reputation of being a psycho come through. Riley Cusick takes the dual roles here where he can show two very different characters, that need each other to stay on a more stable side of things in life.
Story – The story here follows a young woman who returns to her hometown, where she will get to know the twins that were close to her sister who vanished years before, as we see how the threes lives have changed after that incident. This is a story that is filled with the ideas of dread, uneasy behavior coated in making us see the hope for something better the lead three characters have. The idea that the two twins have gone down different paths, but need each other so badly, is the highlight of the film, showing how they might never be able to carry on without each other. The story does however leave a lot to the imagination as to certain action, never seemingly looking to over commit to one side or the other, diving more into the unknown with how we are left.
Themes – Autumn Road is a horror that will look at the unknown of the world that three find themselves in after a childhood incident, show the different paths they have taken, showing the darker side from one, which will create the horrors for the other two. The settings are used to show the small-town reputations that can get pinned upon people, with the haunted house interior being the highlight of the horror created.
Final Thoughts – Autumn Road is a horror filled with bleakness and hope, leaving us to see which side the character’s lives will fall on.