Netflix’s ‘Hold the Dark’ is not your traditional horror movie, but the undertone of Dustin Garneau’s movie starring Jeffrey Wright, Alexander Skarsgard, James Badge Dale, and Riley Keough is of a dreadful, dark, sinister secret that holds a town within it’s grasp.
The majestic Alaskan landscapes are speckled with a horror that seems, at first glance, attributed to wolves, who we are led to believe are preying on young children who steer too far into the woods.
The synopsis says, “Summoned to a remote Alaskan village to search for the wolves that killed three children, a wolf expert soon finds himself unravelling a harrowing mystery.”
The story centers on wolf expert Russell Core (Wright) who answers a call up to the Alaskan wilderness by grieving mother Medora Sloane (Keough) to hunt down the wolves that she believes are responsible for the death of her son.
A twist turns her husband, Vernon, who just returned from a tour in Iraq, into a revenge-thirsty hunter who goes to a dark place to hunt down and kill who is responsible for his son’s death.
The movie has a lot of surprises hidden in it’s slow, methodical pace, and includes betrayal, a massacre, shootouts, murder, incest, and the reuniting of long-lost family members.
While Hold the Dark’s plot is interesting, and the acting is strong, the movie’s dull pace slows down any momentum the plot builds with it’s endless twists, turns, and wrinkles. All in all, it’s a solid movie, but one that can lose a viewer with it’s pacing.
If you’re wide awake, then this movie is worth it, otherwise the slow pace may lull you to sleep before you get to the meaty parts of the film’s plot.