The Unknown
Welcome to the present-day uninhabited island of New Avalon, Vermont, where, in 1926, four women lived under the guidance of a spirit medium. Renowned film director Ronan Peters is making a movie about these five women, who vanished, leaving only their dresses hanging in an old oak near the main house. Ronan is hands-on, celebrated for the visceral experiences he brings to his audience. Unsurprisingly, a mandatory contract clause demands the cast live on New Avalon for a week, exactly as the five women lived in 1926 – no access to electricity, cell phones, or technology, and era-appropriate costume, food, and utensils. Four women are each assigned the cottage their character had lived in. The fifth, the historical guide of the commune, to be played by a world-renowned actress, lives in the main house with the director and two others. Filming will take place elsewhere at an unassigned date.
Marin Keane, hired three days before from a waitressing job, assumes this debut role she has landed in a bona fide film will be small: but when Ronan reveals his script, she’s cast as Daisy Rue, the lead character upon whose diary the film is based, and Ronan has scripted the diarised events and dialogue almost word-for-word.
Sager’s gothic horror is a psychological cat-and-mouse game, as one by one each cast member becomes her character. The interweaving timeframes are sometimes confusing, with five characters using ten names. Other than Marin/Daisy (and the medium), I wasn’t always sure which of the three actresses in the present was who in the past, making their actions, traits and dialogue difficult to interpret. The sense of menace wavers, perhaps partly due to character confusion, and I was unconvinced by the basic premise once revealed. However, Sager writes well, and I read eagerly to the resolution and wasn’t disappointed.
