‘Caddo Lake’ (2024) Review: Connecting the Dots
Once in a while, the film industry will release an ambitious mystery movie. Celine Held and Logan George’s Caddo Lake, produced by M. Night Shyamalan, features dual protagonists in this mysterious drama that unexpectedly changes one family’s history.
Paris (Dylan O’Brien) is working through the trauma of losing his mother in a fatal car crash. While she was driving the car, she had a seizure and lost control of the vehicle. Since his mother’s death, he has been trying to get answers. Paris tries to consult with different doctors and get their opinions but they don’t want to help him. He knows that there is something more to the story than just a seizure that killed his mother. He suspects it has something to do with Caddo Lake itself.
In a different part of town, Ellie (Eliza Scanlen) is a rebellious spirit. She has a difficult relationship with her mother Celeste (Lauren Ambrose) and desperately wants to know her father’s identity and whereabouts. Celeste refuses to answer her questions and at the mention of Ellie’s father, she turns into a different person. The only person Elli has a good relationship with is her 8-year-old stepsister Anna (Caroline Falk). One evening after a fight, Ellie leaves the house in her boat. The next morning, Celeste calls Ellie to inform her that Anna has gone missing. She followed Ellie in a boat and disappeared, never to be found. Ellie finds herself searching for Anna in the bayou — further than she had imagined.
Held and George’s Caddo Lake is certainly an ambiguous story. The ideas are present, the details are unmissable. The story of Ellie and Paris is woven quite carefully, solely relying on visual imagery and less dialogue to tell their interconnected story from different realities. It’s not an easy task but the duo directors have delivered a worthy plot in parallel perspectives.
However, the problem with Caddo Lake is, that while the story of Ellie and Paris’s interconnected realities drives the story, the third act is the biggest weakness. The movie tries to complicate itself with twists and turns that don’t add anything to the plot except to distract the viewer. Ellie and Paris’s dual storylines are interconnected, which is very straightforward and obvious. The viewer doesn’t have to pay that close attention to the story to understand the complicated narrative.
Held and George take quite an ambitious step with the narrative structure. Because of this, the third act turns into a muddled mess that falls short. The directors are too focused on the meticulous details to convey the central question and conclude the mystery between the dual storylines. This well-crafted idea lacks the emotional drive and the conclusion doesn’t reach the ultimate payoff.
Caddo Lake is a disappointing mystery drama that had the potential to be a promising story. The plot gets convoluted with too many twists and turns, which makes it hard to balance dual storylines. It expresses the layers of the human condition and explores themes of family, loss and abusive parents. But it never excels to that level of emotional clarity needed. Held and George conclude the movie leaving the viewer with more questions and an unstable, disappointing third act. Strange things happen at Caddo Lake. The movie fails to connect the dots of the mysterious deaths and disappearances that plague the small town.
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