THE AXIOM (2018)

Studio:      Vertical Entertainment
Director:    Nicholas Woods
Writer:      Nicholas Woods
Producer:  Max Landwirth
Stars:     Hattie Smith, Zac Titus, Nicole Dambro, Taylor Flowers, Michael Peter Harrison, William Kircher

Review Score:

---

Summary:

Searching for her missing sister in a mysterious forest leads a young woman and her friends into an otherworldly nightmare.

---

Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

To punish her for having an affair, Leon forces his wife Jessica to go through a portal known as ‘The Axiom’ in Cinder Creek forest. A creature called a ‘drogyr’ slits Jessica’s throat.

With her brother Martin, Martin’s fiancée Darcy, Darcy’s mentally troubled brother Edgar, and their friend Gerrik, McKenzie Cody heads to Cinder National Park to look for her missing sister Marylyn. On the drive, Edgar reads from Marylyn’s journal, which references “a doorway leading to another world” and “a place where nature behaves differently.”

The group stops at Sugarloaf Café and Market to meet Leon, who told McKenzie through Craigslist that he could help her find Marylyn. Leon warns McKenzie about the rumored portal to The Axiom, which she keeps secret from the others. Leon gives McKenzie vials of a red liquid that he claims will prevent hallucinatory visions along with a map and a phone for contacting him. Leon also gives McKenzie and Martin a photo of his wife and asks them to recover Jessica’s necklace.

McKenzie has Gerrik pass through the unseen portal in the forest first. Unaware that he stepped into a parallel dimension, Gerrik momentarily sees everyone else vanish.

Edgar sees a vision of a dead woman that he dismisses as a hallucination of his troubled mind. When he sees Leon’s photo later, Edgar realizes that the ghost was Jessica.

McKenzie breaks into a traveler’s outpost looking for signs of Marylyn. Gerrik observes that the sun isn’t going down no matter how late it gets. McKenzie recovers Jessica’s necklace from a locked box.

Martin and Darcy have sex in the woods. Martin hallucinates a drogyr slitting Darcy’s throat.

McKenzie experiences a vision of a man with a slashed throat attacking her. McKenzie drinks one of Leon’s vials and the vision vanishes.

Weirded out when the group finds blood and iron shackles outside the cabin, Edgar goes into the forest alone to clear his head. Edgar encounters Jessica’s ghost again.

Martin discovers disturbing pages torn out of Marylyn’s journal. McKenzie confesses that the woods are rumored to be dangerous and a number of people have gone missing there. Upset over the revelation, Martin, Darcy, and Gerrik go outside to leave.

McKenzie follows after her friends. However, they suddenly act as though nothing out of the ordinary is happening.

McKenzie calls Leon while searching the woods for Edgar. Leon warns that “they” are coming.

McKenzie returns to camp to find Darcy missing and Martin and Gerrik unconscious from a drogyr attack. McKenzie helps the two men recover. Martin and McKenzie find Darcy tied to a tree while Edgar stabs her in a state of possession. Martin captures Edgar and shackles him outside the outpost.

Martin sends McKenzie for help, but Jessica’s ghost prevents her from leaving the cabin. When McKenzie calls Leon, he admits that Marylyn was never at the outpost, but promises to tell McKenzie where her sister is if she brings Jessica’s necklace to the portal entrance.

McKenzie goes into the woods alone. McKenzie briefly encounters a vision of Marylyn.

Martin confronts Edgar, who has no memory of attacking Darcy. Edgar becomes possessed and warns Martin that “they” are coming.

Gerrik wanders away from the outpost entranced. Gerrik encounters a doppelganger and also sees Jessica’s ghost.

While looking for Gerrik, Martin calls Leon. Leon tells Martin that the only way to deal with Edgar’s possession is to either cut off his head or burn him.

Edgar strangles Darcy with the chain on his shackles. After encountering more visions, Martin returns to the outpost to find Darcy dead. Martin stabs Edgar, but Edgar becomes transformed by possession. Martin flees.

Having also become possessed, Gerrik attacks McKenzie. Martin interrupts the assault. Resurrected in an entranced state, Darcy arrives with an ax and kills Gerrik.

McKenzie and Martin flee, but become separated at the portal entrance when McKenzie crosses back into reality. Teens Ernie and Daniel capture McKenzie with a man named Charl.

Leon joins Charl, Ernie, and Daniel. Leon tells McKenzie that the drogyr creatures are body possessors and the two teenagers are part of a group that hunts them for sport. Leon admits that he forced his wife into The Axiom and sent Marylyn in there too.

Leon explains that there are at least six different axioms, each containing unique monsters. Leon tells McKenzie that Marylyn and Martin are in different axioms and she has to choose who she wants to save.

McKenzie chooses to rescue Marylyn first. Leon warns that in Marylyn’s axiom, McKenzie will have to confront a creature called a ‘rapax.’

McKenzie finds Marylyn inside her axiom. Despondent over her situation, Marylyn slits her own throat. McKenzie flees when a creature in a cloak comes to collect Marylyn’s body. McKenzie runs into a massive tusked monster.

McKenzie survives and unexpectedly returns to Leon. Holding a knife to his throat and then taking him at gunpoint, McKenzie forces Leon to come with her into Martin’s axiom. McKenzie runs to the outpost when Jessica comes to attack Leon.

McKenzie finds Martin at the outpost. However, Martin stabs his sister while possessed. McKenzie then resurrects in an entranced state.

---

Review:

Marylyn is missing. After writing some ravings in her journal about “a doorway leading to another world” and “a place where nature behaves differently,” the young woman took a trek into Cinder National Forest and hasn’t been seen since.

With her brother Martin, Martin’s fiancée Darcy, Darcy’s mentally troubled brother Edgar, and their comic relief British buddy Gerrik in tow, McKenzie sets out to find her missing sister. Before entering the weird woods, the quintet stops for a bite of exposition from local mystery man Leon. Answering McKenzie’s Craigslist ad for information, Leon confirms Marylyn’s cryptic claims of creatures, disappearing people, and portals to parallel dimensions.

McKenzie knows what this sounds like to outside ears. That’s why she keeps these secrets to herself. Pocketing a few vials of red liquid that Leon says will prevent haunting hallucinations, McKenzie hits the trail with her friends none the wiser to the otherworldly dangers in store.

Shortly after passing over a possibly paranormal threshold, Edgar experiences strange visions of a dead woman’s ghoulish ghost. Gerrik observes that it’s nearly 9pm, yet the sun stays high in the sky. Blood and iron shackles decorate the side of an outpost where everyone makes camp. Something unknown is undeniably overtaking the atmosphere. And that something threatens to mutilate everyone if they aren’t driven mad first.

During the late ‘80s heyday of video store blind rentals, before I had consistent access to Fangoria, entertainment choices were made based on cover art and a back-of-box blurb. With its poster featuring a lanky “Pan’s Labyrinth”-like creature and a summary citing cursed woods, murderous monsters, and dimensional doorways, “The Axiom” ticks both boxes for initial intrigue.

In that imaginary scenario, early teen me probably would have been pleased with the pickup. I don’t mean to suggest that writer/director Nicholas Woods’ debut feature skews toward younger audiences, because it definitely doesn’t. I merely mean to say that “The Axiom” reminds me of the mid-tier horror movies that were more commonplace a few decades back.

In other words, it doesn’t have the heft to become a title talked about in wide circles, much less turn into a franchise. But an estimable effort gives “The Axiom” enough of an identity to potentially earn a cult following. Think of it as the kind of low frequency radar blip you’ll randomly remember in passing and a friend might respond, “oh I saw that, it was pretty good.”

I imagine that anyone with similarly undemanding expectations for low-key chills will feel fulfilled too. Unfamiliar faces and guerrilla cinematography instantly out “The Axiom” as a microbudget movie. As far as grassroots horror goes however, “The Axiom” has a solidly developed story that helps it become one of the better-executed indies to swim in largely disappointing DTV streams.

At worst, aspects of the production come across as uneven, but never outright awful. Actors do okay for the most part, with their greatest sins being selling something using too much bug-eyed expressiveness or exhibiting plain personalities. Sparsely seen monsters generally meet their marks too, with only one entity, a cloaked man rocking weirdly wobbly tusks, looking like he dressed in an off-the-rack Halloween costume.

Word-wise, the script builds a story out of fractured folklore and other bizarre bits that could have sounded utterly laughable if issued from inexperienced mouths. Respectable credit goes to William Kircher, who chews on Leon’s detailed dialogue with gravelly gravitas. Kircher’s performance possesses the strength to carry “The Axiom” out of silliness and into seriousness by creating a grounded character to accentuate supernatural creeps.

Outside of the above, there isn’t much evaluative insight to add. Contrivances come into play to keep plot gears grinding, like the collective habit where no one mentions their strange experiences when a simple “hey, that happened to me too!” would solve certain mysteries early on. Still, “The Axiom’s” backstory packs more imagination than you’re likely to find in most “cabin in the woods” thrillers, even though its slow-burn spooks stay straightforward.

Not every movie has to burn down a barn. For those times when you just want satisfying smolder to hook your head for 95 minutes, “The Axiom” scratches an itch for appealingly average entertainment. You could certainly do a lot worse, as indie horror often doesn’t come much better.

Review Score: 70

---