‘Brightwood’ is a very awesome indie sci-fi horror thriller that premiered at horror film festivals around the world since October 2022. After almost a year of being showcased only at horror film festivals, it was finally released online on August 22, 2023. And, honestly, seeing that it only had a $14K budget, it’s one of the better horror flicks I’ve seen this year.
The plot is kind of similar to that of ‘Eden Lake’ with Michael Fassbender, mixed with elements of ‘Timecrimes,’ ‘Triangle,’ ‘The Blair Witch Project,’ or even a bit of ‘Midsommar’ in terms of the horror happening during the daytime. The ending, however, definitely twisted some heads and minds. If you want to know what the ending – and the whole film – was about, you’re in the right place!
WARNING: Spoilers for Dane Elcar’s ‘Brightwood’ will be present throughout the article. If you still haven’t seen the film, check it out first, and then come back to continue reading.
- Article breakdown
- ‘Brightwood’ is a low-budget film with only two cast members playing their roles, albeit multiple versions of those roles.
- It delivers on several fronts, including a strong commentary on human relationships, drama, thriller, and horror, but also sci-fi.
- The ending, as well as the entire film, is a metaphor for relationships – specifically, for marriage – and speaks about how terrifying it may be to accept the other person with all their flaws. Only then can a couple truly coexist – embracing their imperfections and working together towards a better existence.
What is ‘Brightwood’ about?
‘Brightwood’ is a low-budget indie sci-fi horror thriller that stars only two cast members – Dana Berger portraying Jen and Max Woertendyke portraying Dan, respectively. The film was written, directed, and edited by Dane Elcar, with the original score by Jason Cook and only a handful of other crew members to help make the project happen.
The entire film was shot in one spot that was actually open to the public during the shooting, so Elcar had to work around people passing by, fishing, etc. With such minor resources, they managed to create something that feels similar to other movies we’ve seen before but unique at the same time.
It starts with Dan and Jen – a married couple – out on a morning jog around a lake. Jen is here to do four laps, and Dan follows behind, wanting to accompany Jen because they really don’t spend any time together anymore. Their relationship soured, and Jen openly admits to thinking about stabbing Dan in the neck all the time because she thinks he just became worthless.
He doesn’t take care of himself at all, and at a party to celebrate Jen’s promotion at work, he drinks two bottles of wine and hits on one of her friends. Their relationship has all but collapsed, but Dan is adamant about reminding Jen that they have been together a long time and that they need to choose the direction in which their relationship will go. Little did he know, they’d get to decide many, many times.
You see, as they make a full circle, Dan and Jen start to realize that, bizarrely, the path that they used to come to the lake simply vanished. It’s not long before they realize that they can’t escape and that something very strange is happening to them. Every time they circle the lake, it seems as if the loop starts all over again.
They realize that time and space seem to be in an endless loop when Jen drops her earbuds on the floor, and after they circle the lake, they see numerous earbuds at the very same place she dropped them.
Soon, they see a hooded figure but can never seem to catch it. When they do, they realize the person looks exactly like Dan. In fact, it seems that it is Dan, just another version of him. At one point in the film, Jen even jokes about how aliens must’ve visited the lake and are now messing with them. That’s when things get violent.
How does ‘Brightwood’ end?
Soon, we realize that every time Dan and Jen circled around the lake, it created additional variants of them, starting from where they’d started. The more they circle around, the more variants or versions of them, if you will, come into existence. The hooded figures they were seeing were actually those different versions of them, being in the loop for different durations.
Some variants have been around for so long that they started starving to death, with no food source anywhere around them. Even the lake seems to be void of food sources. So, they slowly settled their differences and started working together, depending on each other to survive. They killed other versions of Dan and Jen passing by for food, surviving in the loop for so long.
To make matters even weirder, all throughout the movie, a sound kept echoing across the lake, giving both Dan and Jen headaches. As the acts in the film progress, we get to follow three different ‘sets’ of the couple, as the previous ones get killed by their successors. In the end, we see Jen finding an odd metallic orb from which the sound seemed to be coming from.
What was actually going on here, and what does this all mean?
‘Brightwood’ ending explained
Many things were left ambiguous in the film on purpose. There’s a reason why we never got a deeper backstory about Dan and Jen – they are meant to be vague but relatable. The entire film, of course, with all its sci-fi elements, is actually an allegory about marriage and relationships.
Dan and Jen were, after a long time together, stuck in a never-ending loop of arguing and resentment that only led to more of the same and to them drifting apart even further. Dan became more phlegmatic, whereas Jen became more spiteful, and it would never end because they couldn’t accept each other’s flaws and imperfections.
When we get to the second Dan and Jen, they slowly start accepting that there is no way out of this and that the only way they can survive is by killing older versions of themselves in order to nourish their newer selves and coexist. In the end, they profess their love to each other, and once they do, they start coexisting and surviving together, no matter how hard it gets.
That’s what Elcar wanted to achieve. Sure, you have the metallic orb at the end and Jen’s joke about aliens being responsible, so this whole thing might actually be created by alien technology. While Elcar leaves that option on the table – or even seemingly confirms it – that’s not really the point. That’s not where the horror comes from.
The terrifying thing about this film is the relationship between Dan and Jen, which is so relatable for many couples. Their problems are real, something that thousands deal with in a long relationship. It can’t work until each partner starts accepting the other or until they start changing – “killing” their old selves to survive with their partner.
The movie wants to showcase just how difficult and complex emotions can be. Dan and Jen both love and hate each other at the same time and not communicating through their problems caused them to spit toxicity and years of resentment into each other’s faces after a single minor problem emerged.
Even Elcar himself explained what he wanted to accomplish and tell his audience:
“I really wanted to make a horror film about relationships. You know, something truly terrifying!” – he said and continued:
“I really wanted to dissect a long-term relationship. To see what would happen if I dropped them into that scenario. It allowed me to really explore the emotional cycles that can happen–the kind of progression and then regression in and out of toxicity. Love and hate.”
In the end, as Elcar put it – to him, the film is a love story. Remove all the supernatural elements of the story and say it was merely a couple getting lost in the woods, trying to work through it together. They slowly realize that they love each other, need each other, and can only keep going if they hold onto each other and depend on each other.
You can find ‘Brightwood’ for streaming on Amazon Prime Video and Vudu, while it can be bought/rented on Amazon, Apple TV, Google Play, Kino Now, and YouTube, while also being available to buy physically on DVD from Kino Lorber, Amazon, Best buy, Barnes & Noble, Walmart, and other spots.
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