Pictured: The Characters in This Movie Not Letting Go (CREDIT: Lionsgate)
Starring: Halle Berry, Percy Daggs IV, Anthony B. Jenkins
Director: Alexandre Aja
Running Time: 101 Minutes
Rating: R for The Forest at Its Gnarliest and Bloodiest
Release Date: September 20, 2024 (Theaters)
What’s It About?: In a cabin deep in the woods live the last three people on Earth, and their trusty dog. Or at least that’s the story that the mother (Halle Berry) tells her twin sons Nolan (Percy Daggs IV) and Sammul (Anthony B. Jenkins). According to Momma, it’s not that the entire human population has died, but rather that everyone has been possessed by a vague, unrelenting Evil. Momma and the boys are only able to survive because their cabin has been specially blessed. So whenever they venture outside, they tie themselves to a rope tethered to the house, as breaking free would leave them vulnerable to the grasp of the Evil. But when their living supplies run low, they’re forced to resort to desperate measures to survive. And that is NOT a formula for maintaining trust in each other.
What Made an Impression?: Extreme Experiences, Extreme Measures: The most logical explanation about the Evil of Never Let Go is that it’s all in Momma’s head, perhaps due to mental illness or apocalyptic religious beliefs, or some combination thereof. Kevin Coughlin and Ryan Grassby’s script and Alexandre Aja’s direction certainly nudges us in that direction. There are some generally creepy humanoid creatures with slithery forked tongues, but only Momma is able to see them, for the most part. She may have also just constructed a fable to protect her family from the more quotidian evils of the world, as she frequently hints about the bad life she escaped from before The Evil. That sounds like a reference to something like addiction and/or abusive relationships, although the way she tells it, it could just be that she moved to a big city and found it to be too godless for her sensibilities.
Ambiguity Overload: That vagueness within Momma’s backstory is infused throughout the entire movie. While the most logical explanation is never not that the Evil is all just in Momma’s head, this is a horror movie, so there’s no good reason why there couldn’t be a supernatural alternative. But whenever there’s evidence refuting Momma’s version of events, she doesn’t offer any compelling reason to believe beyond “That’s just the Evil playing tricks on you.” The final act muddies things quite a bit, though. Nolan, the more doubtful of the two brothers, is a defiant survivor, whereas Sammul appears to be quite vulnerable to possession, although perhaps that’s because he’s inherited some of his mother’s most catastrophic personality traits. The final moments appear to confirm that the Evil is in fact just a story, only to then linger in a way that says, “Actually maybe it is real.”
Ultimately, Never Let Go is compelling as a portrait of what it’s like to have a parent who insists that you need to escape from society without sufficient empirical evidence for why. And there’s something to be said for horror that keeps things unnervingly vague. But this one might have been a bit too vague. If you’re like me, you’ll hold on to the rope while you’re watching, but you’ll be happy to let go soon thereafter.
Never Let Go is Recommended If You Like: Dusty boots and jackets, Eating tree bark, Holding on to one prized vinyl record
Grade: 2.5 out of 5 Ropes
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