The Midnight Swim

According to locals, Spirit Lake is bottomless. Somewhere in its algae-laden depths lies the body of June’s mother, who recently vanished in the lake. June and her two half-sisters have returned to their mother’s house to seek answers about her death. Instead of concrete evidence, they find astrological clues that eerily mirror a local legend about a family of sisters who nocturnally entered the lake one-by-one, never to return. As the legend burrows deeper into their psyches, the sisters’ history of emotional repression rises to the surface. A slow-boiling thriller that spins a psychological labyrinthine web in lieu of cheap scares and violence, Sarah Adina Smith’s THE MIDNIGHT SWIM is the grand buffet for the discerning consumer of creepy cinema. This film, shot with a POV-camera, cleverly subverts the gimmick of “found footage” films. It’s not the chilly lake that’ll freeze the marrow in your bones, it’s what lies behind the characters’ eyes. (In English and Turkish with subtitles) – C.P.