Where do we find the line between grief and horror? At which point does our mind decide to accept something and yet find a credible explanation within the incredible? This is something very much woven into the texture of Lake Mungo, an Australian documentary-style horror that follows a family, the Palmers, following the loss of their sixteen year old daughter Alice. The film's narrative shows how they deal with the bereavement and the impact this loss has on the family unit, and how the aftermath is messier than the event itself. If this only makes it sound like a rather maudlin melodrama about death and loss, that is to misrepresent this film. What we have here is a genuinely spooky film, which will at times make you extremely uncomfortable and, bets of all, makes you afraid of what is not there. The age old adage of 'the less you see, the scarier it is' applies rarely as well as it does here. The film tackles the subject of ghosts sensibly, letting us doubt the truth as to the presence of supernatural forces instead of forcing us to assume their de-facto presence immediately, as can often be the problem of horror films. As the family starts to come to believe that their daughter is somehow appearing to them, and her communications start turning up shocking revelations about her life, the film gets creepier and more skin-crawlingly disturbing as it reaches its climax. There are several twists that are far from easily spotted, and the film performs some excellent acts of misdirection and cinematic sleights of hand that prevent the obvious explanations from surfacing.
The film's balance of cynicism and belief is evenly balanced; the characters are rational and believable, and for once does not immediately throw the 'woman believes, man scoffs' chestnut at us. Everybody here is confused and suspicious as to what is going on, which makes Ray Kemeny (a medium) a fascinating presence as nobody really believes he is attempting to help anybody. His eventual connection with the family is quite touching, but is earned by his virtues as a man rather than decided through his role as a spiritual medium. Probably the most frightening aspects of Lake Mungo are what turn up in the found camera footage. While the idea of the son being a major film buff and having loads of cameras does feel a bit crowbarred in so we can get this footage in the first place, it is the only viable explanation as to how it is present in the movie at all. It does however, provide considerably more scares than Paranormal Activity does; especially when one of the film's finest moment, in which we are shown an old piece of footage in a new light that changes the truth we have established so well that it genuinely shocks you. Dissecting the film too thoroughly will ruin the surprise, but let us just say it uses the documentary format well and ultimately produces one of the most frightening horror films of recent times. It also manages to unleash a cavalcade of horrifying revelations that make the skin crawl. The possible reason for this is the realism of the whole thing. It starts off as that most nightmarish of situations, in which a girl is missing and her whereabouts are unknown. Except instead of being reassured with a simple truth of death, and the ability to grieve and then move on, the story of Alice gets longer, more sinister and complicated and it begins to deeply affect the characters of the film. The first two acts are bad enough but the final third is just devastating, and contains perhaps one of the single most disturbing twists I have seen a horror film. Believe me, Blair Witch's kid-in-the-corner has nothing on Lake Mungo's final storytelling flourish.
Let us try to wrap this up by reasoning why Lake Mungo is as frightening as it is. Films about demonic possession have scared people for years, but these days, the demons are tangible entities usually rendered as special effects - we know it is fake and very little the filmmakers can do convince us otherwise. With teenagers becoming more of a mystery to the previous generation however, a terror of pedophiles lurking around around every corner and our own fascination with macabre secrets, it is clear that our fears have shifted. The monsters no longer have big teeth and claws, but disarming smiles and hidden basements. Lake Mungo taps into these deepest darkest fears, and runs amok with them. Disturbing, ghostly, frightening and never pulling a single punch, Lake Mungo is one of the best horror films of the year, if not the decade.
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