Keeper Review: Stellar Moments but Lacks Consistency

Keeper, starring Tatiana Maslany and Rossif Sutherland, features two lovers (Malcolm and Liz) going away to his cabin to celebrate being together for a year. The cabin conversation is awkward, filled with non-sequiturs and uninvited guests (Malcolm's "cousin" Darren, played by Birkett Turton, and his "date," Minka, played by Eden Weiss). The film doesn't hide the ball as to the violence that may ensue, opening with at first voyeuristic imagery of women across the centuries and then violent imagery before the audience meets the "happy" couple.

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Keeper Review: Acting

Tatiana Maslany gives a masterclass in this film. Her performance of disillusionment, fear, paranoia, and denial spans the spectrum of modern horror film acting: from full-tilt Nick Cage to subtle stoicism. The pendulum between the two is truthful. Her performance always felt genuine inside of a slowly building paranormal world.

Rossif Sutherland is also strong. He plays a character playing a character, which can be tricky. The character can't be too obvious to the audience, otherwise the character he is fooling seems like a moron. This is done well in Keeper.

Both actors give the sense that something is hidden, but what it is remains up for debate for a while. A lover who is older, wealthy, and tries too hard presents as someone having an affair instead of the sinister elements that follow in this film. A woman playing along, hoping that the lover is simply awkward, is also believable.

Keeper Review: Obsession with the Occult

Osgood Perkins is now on a run of occult films, with varying degrees of human connection to tether them to reality. The creepiness of an image has a lasting effect on the audience, but do the stories behind it? Does the narrative have enough drive to make someone return to this film? In Long Legs, the explanation is clean and clear. In Keeper, the viewer relies on their own interpretation and Maslany's skillful acting to follow what is happening.

But perhaps this focus on the occult does reveal something about contemporary society. We do seem increasingly obsessed with the things that we can't control, powers we don't understand. Perkins' films play on the idea that people blame cult-like goings-on for why some things happen. At the end of each story, it is the acceptance of these things that allows those preyed upon to either move on or become the predators. Having seen his prior two films, the plot revealed itself in the first minute and a half. To compensate for that simplicity, the screen is filled with increasingly grotesque imagery, cut together quickly to catch the viewer off guard.

Keeper Review, Rating, and Ranking In Brief

Review: In a year of strong horror, Osgood Perkins' Keeper fails to stand out. Maslany's performance is among the best of the year, but it will likely be buried by an awkward script that relies too heavily on disturbing imagery rather than imagery that supports the narrative.

Rating: 3/5

Ranking: 25/38 (Ranking in the total number of films I've seen in the theater in 2025)

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