Lifetime
A few months ago, Lifetime gave us a nifty — although apparently controversial — true life thriller, Nobody Dumps My Daughter, which had a really cool 90s TV movie vibe (which is exactly what the director was going for). It ended up being one of the network’s better movies of 2024. Their Sunday night movies often feel like throwaways, getting little promotion and zero assets on the company’s press site, so of course that gives us the lowest of expectations for whatever airs on a Sunday night. And that includes The Bear Lake Murders. But… you can also be surprised by something that turns out to be a hidden gem.
Spoiler Warning: It will be difficult to review this movie without discussing some of the major plot points so if you haven’t yet seen the movie, watch it and come back to read our assessment.
The Bear Lake Murders stars Mercedes de la Zerda as big city detective Ally Foster, just coming off the resolution of a long-running serial killer case, finally apprehending Caden Hodge who, it seems, has been toying with Detective Foster, almost setting himself up to be captured, but hinting that she might want to keep looking over her shoulder. In appreciation for her work, the department decides she needs mandatory time off to recharge and deal with her emotions after solving the case, much against her wishes, pleading with her CO that she needs to work to distract her from everything. No dice, she’s gotta go. So she heads back to her small hometown of Bear Lake where she tries to keep a low profile, doing all she can to avoid running into people from her past. That’s easier said than done as old friend and town deputy Brodie Doyle spots her in the local coffee shop. She asks that he not tell anyone she’s there, but he basically runs right back and tells Sheriff Roy Martin, who was her old flame, that Ally is in town. On her walk back to her family cabin, she also runs into another old flame, Miles (basically the other man in her relationship with Roy), and the two exchange pleasantries but Ally really just wants to be left alone.
It isn’t long before Roy shows up on her doorstep, and his sister Rebecca is in on the secret as well. Rebecca is also a huge fan of an influencer named Sienna, who travels the country and posts videos about her experiences and she also just happens to be in Bear Lake. Sienna isn’t quite the bubbly personality she portrays, grousing about the amount of time it takes to get a coffee and none-too-thrilled to run into Rebecca (literally, spilling said coffee all over herself) who gushes over her and says she wants to be an influencer as well. Sienna remarks that Rebecca would never be as good as she is, and storms off, leaving Rebecca to fully understand the old saying, ‘Never meet your heroes’. Brodie comes upon the upset Rebecca and learns what happened, and he does his best to pump her up, telling her she absolutely can be as good, if not better than Sienna. Later, Sienna turns up … dead at the bottom of The Point, and a news bulletin alerts Ally and friends that a prison transport with Caden Hodge drove off a cliff, killing everyone … but Hodge’s body is missing. Later there are some issues with tourists partying too hard and playing music too loud which Brodie attempts to deal with, while Miles also inserts himself into the conversation, completely over-stepping his bounds and making Brodie seem weak and ineffective at his job. (Miles also has a tendency to show up out of nowhere carrying his rifle, claiming to have been hunting.) Later that night, the mouthy young man goes for a swim but when returning to the dock is electrocuted when touching the metal ladder, rigged by a figure in a hooded jacket, the same figure who pushed Sienna off the cliff. Fearing Bear Lake has another (or the return of) a serial killer, and with Caden Hodge possibly in town just waiting to make his move on Ally, she, Roy, and Brodie snap into action to find the killer before anyone else — like Rebecca — finds themselves lying at the bottom of The Point. The question is — whodunnit?
The Bear Lake Murders is that hidden gem mentioned earlier. The screenplay by Ken Miyamoto does a really nice job of setting up the situation, placing Caden Hodge firmly in the spotlight as the serial killer in Bear Lake, and gives us more than enough suspects to also suggest Hodge is not the killer, and may even be dead himself. Unfortunately, whether it’s the structure of the screenplay or Danny J. Boyle’s directorial choices, any tension that could have kept the killer’s identity a mystery is quickly dissipated early on after Rebecca’s encounter with Sienna and her conversation with Brodie. And again, whether it’s a directorial choice or one made by the actor — and this is the same issue we had with Boyle’s The Last Thing She Said — Blake Williams telegraphs to the audience that he is the killer, even though none of the other characters seem to pick up in his twitchy behavior. Also the two murders come much too close to Brodie’s encounters with the victims, so even though the movie wants you to think it’s Hodge, or even Miles because of his dislike of tourists, it is as plain as day that Brodie is the killer. The movie could have actually used a couple more killings to give it a real slasher vibe and not make it so obviously simply revenge killings, first for Sienna dissing Rebecca, whom Brodie obviously has a thing for, and the mouthy tourist who diminished Brodie’s authority. That being said, keeping the killer in shadow and saving the reveal for a pivotal moment when Rebecca finds Sienna’s phone buried under some rocks at her murder scene, are some nice touches.
Lifetime
Even with the very obvious identity of the killer, The Bear Lake Murders succeeds because it does have a good story and a few surprises near the end. The cast is also excellent (even though de la Zerda, Williams and Tom Stevens feel a bit young for their positions of authority). De la Zerda does a nice job of playing the world weary detective who very obviously needs a vacation but wants to throw herself into her work. After a little R&R, she does snap back into action to help Roy with the murders (and apparently Bear Lake has a history of mysterious killings). Her relationships with Roy and Miles feel authentic and her connection to Bear Lake feels real. Tom Stevens gives his Sheriff Roy a little edge of being in over his head, which is appropriate since he basically took over the job after the death of his father (which, it seems, may have also been a murder judging by one quick line of dialogue). He’s doing his best but Brodie is obviously not cut out to be a deputy and Roy is frustrated by that and the new murders. He also plays Roy as a bit awkward around Ally, which is understandable, and you can feel the tensions rise whenever Miles is also in the pictures. It’s a nice performance all around.
Magalie is very good as well as Rebecca. She fangirls appropriately when she runs into Sienna, she has good chemistry with her main co-stars, and the moment she registers her shock in seeing who killed Sienna is electric, making us invested in her safety. In a way, she actually becomes the movie’s ‘final girl’ once the killer is vanquished as she was nearly his next victim. Now, as for Blake Williams, he does give a good performance, really feeling in over his head at his job, but — again, either by his choice or the director’s guidance — he just begins to play Brodie too obviously as the killer, becoming more twitchy and nervous as things progress (yet no one else picks up on this). Everything would have worked so much better if he wasn’t so obvious, allowing the audience to keep guessing until that reveal with Rebecca. Brandon Giddens, on the other hand, is a little too laid back, and try as they might to make him a suspect he just never feels like a killer. I got more stoned Seth Rogen from him. Chris Fassbender makes for a good Hannibal Lechter wannabe, giving Hodge a sense of intelligence and menace. Jennifer Procé is also really good as Sienna, showing us both sides of an influencer’s life, or maybe the two-faced personality of an influencer (not to suggest that all influencers are putting on a false face to appear warm and inviting in their videos but you never know). In general, the movie is very well cast and everyone does a great job.
Despite the film’s structure — and again we don’t know if it is the script, the director or the acting choices that blow the mystery way too early — it’s still a well-made movie with a little tension, some nice shots (like the hooded figure on the dock silhouetted by the light) and a great cast, giving the film a nice 80s slasher vibe. A couple more bodies and a less obvious killer would have made this one perfect, but it’s still a very enjoyable movie.
The Bear Lake Murders has a run time of 1 hour 30 minutes, and is rated TV-14.
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