An Unnerving and Satisfying Horror Layer Cake

Ever since the cryptic marketing campaign for Osgood Perkins’ “Longlegs” helped make that film a surprise summer hit, the filmmaker’s new home at Neon has treated Perkins’ subsequent releases with as much hype as possible. Calling Perkins the new William Castle would be inaccurate, but the marketing surrounding his post-“Longlegs” films this year has included concepts in the horror master’s tradition. After stunts like a bus full of “dead cheerleaders” driving through Hollywood were used to promote last February’s “The Monkey,” Neon and Perkins cast their minds back to long ago with “Keeper.” Instead of the usual press and media rollout, they chose to keep the majority of the film in near-total secrecy, implying that the horrors hidden within are too shocking or surprising to be revealed early.

It remains to be seen whether this approach will intrigue or repel audiences. From my point of view, this obfuscation adds nothing to the film itself; this might actually hurt it a bit, as it seems to promise an M. Night Shyamalan-type film with an earth-shattering twist, which is something “Keeper” isn’t trying to be. Still, Perkins has made a very intriguing layered film, one that keeps changing subgenres the further you get into it. Although it makes for an unsettling and sometimes frustrating first look, Perkins ultimately provides answers to all of the questions the film raises. As such, “Keeper” becomes the most ambitious film of Perkins’ career, proving that the director’s abilities continue to grow as his status as a master of modern-day horror grows.

One of the most appealing qualities of horror film in general is its penchant for simple premises that lead to crazier, wilder things. “Keeper” is essentially Perkins’ “Cabin in the Woods” film a la “The Evil Dead” or “The Cabin in the Woods,” both films with simple setups that become increasingly gruesome and insane, which Perkins’ film also does. After a foreshadowing montage of women over time in relationships who then encounter something horrible (and, presumably, deadly), we meet Liz (Tatiana Maslany) and Malcolm (Rossif Sutherland). They are a couple at a stage in their relationship where things will soon end or take things to the next level, and in hopes of the latter happening, Malcolm has convinced Liz to accompany him to his family’s home in a secluded (as if reserved for the elite) area of ​​a nearby wood.

As Malcolm works to keep Liz happy, several disturbing things happen. Malcolm’s financier brother, Darren (Birkett Turton), shows up at the house next door with a trophy girlfriend, Minka (Eden Weiss). Darren and Malcolm insist that Liz try a piece of cake said to have been baked by the local caretaker. Then Malcolm is suddenly called away to tend to one of his patients at the hospital, leaving Liz alone in the cabin, at which point the film shifts into high gear into a Polanski-style paranoid thriller. From there, Perkins guides “Keeper” through a variety of subgenres, including folk horror, creature features, a serial killer thriller (with a touch of vampire myth) and fairy tale horror. Rather than being anthological, these changes make “Keeper” the cinematic equivalent of a Matryoshka doll, with something new (but still the same) around every corner.

However, there is a downside to this game of constantly peeling the onion played by “Keeper,” and that is the fact that Perkins and writer Nick Lepard withhold answers to what exactly happens in the film for a remarkably long period of time. It’s absolutely fortunate that Maslany and Sutherland are very watchable actors, as they help the film through these difficult moments. Sutherland in particular is a bit of a revelation for those who haven’t seen much of his work, the majority of which are Canadian productions (where “Keeper” was filmed due to the 2023 strikes); he has a sonorous and hypnotic vocal delivery that is reminiscent of Michael Shannon. Maslany’s prowess won’t come as much of a surprise to those who saw her work in Perkins’ “Orphan Black,” “She-Hulk” and “The Monkey,” but that doesn’t diminish how good she is here. The role of Liz highlights all her strengths and her range as a performer.

So while the film certainly doesn’t lack for intrigue, it feels like Perkins stays away from the truth for too long. The choice is a compromise, because once the other shoe finally drops, the film shifts into high gear, which could have proven exhausting if the film was already at a high level for a while before this happened. The good news is that that long stretch of trail the film lays before reaching its first big punchline will likely look better on a second viewing, allowing all the clues and puzzle pieces the filmmakers present to complete the picture. Such is the price of an ambitious story.

In addition to Maslany and Sutherland’s on-screen performances, Perkins and his collaborators have made “Keeper” the director’s most visually rich film to date. Perkins’ films were always beautiful, of course, with even the garish “The Monkey” having a grotesque beauty. Yet “Keeper” visually mirrors its unfolding mysterious structure, revealing more aspects of the film aesthetically and narratively. The house that production designer Danny Vermette found for the film’s central location is already bizarre before anything scary happens, and cinematographer Jeremy Cox makes the most of creating intensely claustrophobic compositions with it. There is a delightfully jarring lack of geography in the film that is maintained throughout; just like Liz, you never really know where you are, where you’ve just been, or where you might escape.

The real coup de grace in the film’s visual arsenal is its creature designs, which are some of the most inventive seen in a mainstream Western horror film in some time. Without giving away who and what these creatures are, suffice it to say that they fit seamlessly into the thematic threads of the film and their appearance fits into the film’s relationship with folk horror and fairy tale horror; there’s something about them that resembles the work of Neil Jordan (“The Company of Wolves”) and Ken Russell (“Altered States”). They also resemble the work of Junji Ito and are reminiscent of the monsters seen in the “Silent Hill” video games. In short, they’re worth the price of admission and a fantastic bloody cherry on Perkins’ sick cake.

Despite its beasts, “Keeper” is not a monster movie, but rather a scathing look at an idea inherent to human relationships, especially romantic ones. This idea is referenced in the film’s title, a word often used to describe as jaded someone who appears to have value as a romantic partner. Whether it’s that word or calling someone a “trap” or something else, we have a disturbing way of reducing people from individuals to objects of romantic conquest, and it’s this inherent aberration in our language and society that Perkins attacks. By extrapolating the unresolved anxieties and tensions of dating and relationships, Perkins has made a film that feels like a companion piece to films like Andrzej Žulawski’s “Possession,” “Mother!” by Darren Aronofsky and even Michael Shanks’ “Together” from earlier this year. This means that “Keeper” is either a great date movie or a terrible movie, depending on your marital status, and that’s something that feels like a byproduct of Perkins’ mischievous nature.

What’s particularly exciting about “Keeper” is that it confirms Perkins’ penchant for following his own gleefully perverse muse. The filmmaker recently came under fire online for the bizarre accusation of making too many films at once, but that criticism doesn’t hold much water when his films are so obviously different from each other. This film placed next to “Longlegs” and “The Monkey” alone proves that he is not an assembly line or cookie cutter guy. For some reason, the man seems full of creative energy right now, and “Keeper” proves he has a lot more gas in the tank.

/Film rating: 8 out of 10

“Keeper” hits theaters on November 14, 2025.