Consumed Movie Review: Woodland Chills

Mitchell Altieri’s Consumed has some strong performances, but a weak narrative and undercooked ideas bring everything down.

Sure, there’s not a lot you can particularly do when all you have surrounding you are trees, but man, it’s just hard to muster up any interest in what ultimately amounts to a whole lot of standing around waiting for something scary to happen.

Now, horror movies, especially independent ones, often have only a tiny budget to work with, which can only add to the stresses of production. Consumed, from the jump, is a simple film. We follow a couple named Beth (Courtney Halverson, of True Detective) and Jay (Mark Famiglietti) as they take on a camping trip just one year after Beth’s cancer remission. Their little vacation starts well enough, but it doesn’t take long before the woods they reside in begin to show their dark side. As a mysterious skin-wearing creature hunts the couple down, they are saved by Quinn (Devon Sawa), a mysterious hunter living in the woods. Caught between this strange beast and a potentially dangerous man, Beth and Jay find themselves trapped in a horrifying nightmare and must make major sacrifices to escape.

When you’re someone who has watched a lot of horror films, it becomes very easy to spot all the clichés and contrivances that come with the genre. Sometimes, these can be used in charming ways, but other times, they serve to distract and overwhelm you in mediocrity. With Consumed, the set-up is compelling enough, but the execution leaves much to be desired. Whether it’s the budget or the general lack of creativity in the script that brings things down, the result is a movie that can’t stand out from the crowd. Every cliché and moment you’ve seen in horror films like this is hit here with no real fanfare. Budget constraints or not, the general lack of fresh ideas is where Consumed truly crumbles.

The relationship between Beth and Jay is undoubtedly the heart of Consumed, but at the same time, the script by writer David Calbert fails to drive home the emotionality of their situation. Beth is a character who’s deeply impacted by her illness and, despite seemingly beating it, finds herself distracted by something on her mind. Jay, on the other hand, finds his optimism for the future clashing with the trauma of the past.

These struggles the characters face largely get tossed to one side when the film’s horror elements begin to kick in, and frankly, it’s a real shame. Courtney Halverson and Mark Famiglietti are both strong performers, gathering a lot of emotion and heart purely through their confident performances. With the meagre budget on hand, it’s incredibly frustrating that Consumed seems to focus on the wrong things. When you add some cheap-looking CGI into the mix, many of the creepier moments fail to resonate. There’s occasional fun to be had in the film’s use of gore and practical effects, but it ultimately feels empty and underdeveloped.

In the third act of Consumed, there is an attempt to try and wrap its emotional core around its character once more to create a more impactful ending, but it comes a little too late. Despite reaching only 90 minutes, including credits, the film still feels a bit long in the tooth and aimless in what it has to say or what it wants to show on screen. Is it a story about overcoming the trauma of illness, or is it a story about this couple coming together to escape a terrifying skin-wearing monster and ultimately growing stronger together in the process? Consumed attempts to explore these concepts, but it ultimately reaches an unsure answer. Instead, it opts to do both things simultaneously with mixed results.

Consumed is far from a bad horror movie. The performances are strong, and there’s at least some fun to be had in its regular genre thrills. However, it is a case of unrealised potential, as director Mitchell Altieri and writer David Calbert ultimately feel too interested in the things they just don’t have the right script or budget for. The film plays around with some fun and more existential ideas in the third act, but it all arrives a little too late, leaving everything feeling undercooked. Some solid ideas throughout show that both Altieri and Calbert have engaging, creative minds, but it’s all ultimately wrapped around a story that is simply too shallow to hit as hard as it should.

Consumed will be released in US theaters and on demand on August 16, 2024.