Alex Roe, Andra Nechita, Bone Lake, Clayton Spencer, Eliane Reis, horror, Maddie Hasson, Marco Pigossi, Mercedes Bryce Morgan, movies, reviews
October 10, 2025
by Carla Hay
Directed by Mercedes Bryce Morgan
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city, the horror film “Bone Lake” features a white and Latin cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: Two couples are double-booked at a vacation house in a remote wooded area near a lake, and one of the couples turns out to be more dangerous than the other couple.
Culture Audience: “Bone Lake” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of low-budget horror movies that follow familiar formulas but are still suspenseful.
Before it turns into a formulaic slasher flick, “Bone Lake” teases viewers with scenes of psychological manipulation and sexual tension between two couples at a remote lake house. Some of the acting performances are mediocre, but the movie is mostly watchable. There’s also a plot twist that will catch many viewers off guard.
Directed by Mercedes Bryce Morgan and written by Joshua Friedlander, “Bone Lake” had its world premiere at the 2024 edition of Fantastic Fest. The movie takes place in an unnamed city in the United States near a fictional lake nicknamed Bone Lake. The movie was actually filmed in Conyers, Georgia.
There are only six people who are shown acting on screen in “Bone Lake.” The first two are a couple named Brett (played by Clayton Spencer) and Lisa (played by Eliane Reis), who are seen in the beginning of the movie. Brett and Lisa are naked in a wooded area and are running in terror from an unseen attacker or attackers shooting bows and arrows at Lisa and Brett. Lisa dies when she falls down and gets impaled on a fallen tree trunk. Brett dies after an arrow strikes him in the testicles.
The movie then switches to showing the two other live-in couples who are at the center of the story. All four of these lovers are in their 30s. Sage (played by Maddie Hasson) and Diego (played by Marco Pigossi) arrive at the lake house first. Will (played by Alex Roe) and Cin (played by Andra Nechita) arrive next.
Sage is a lifestyle journalist. Her boyfriend Diego, who is originally from Mexico City, is an aspiring novelist. Sage and Diego met when they went to the same college. They are at this rental lake house for a romantic vacation. Diego also plans to propose marriage to Sage and has an engagement ring that he inherited from his grandmother.
However, there’s some tension in the relationship. Diego recently quit his job as a community college teacher so he can work on his first novel. There’s no guarantee that this novel will be published. Sage was a freelance writer who recently took a full-time job as an editor because Diego won’t have an income for an uncertain period of time.
Even though it was Sage’s idea to take this job, she still has some resentment that she is now the only person in their household who will have an income. Sage is more assertive than Diego, but she’s also passive-aggressive when it comes to dealing with conflicts. Diego is insecure about how his novel will be received, so it’s important to him that Sage likes the novel that he will be writing.
Will and Cin (which is short for Cinnamon) are a more affluent couple than Sage and Diego, but they also have a situation where the woman in the relationship has a higher income than the man. Cin says she works as a wealth manager. Will is apparently unemployed. Cin and Will are very open with their sexuality and don’t hesitate to get naked in front of strangers, compared to Sage and Diego, who are more discreet.
Cin and Will arrive at the lake house and say they were booked for the same time period that Sage and Diego are booked at the house. The nearest hotel is 50 miles away. Neither couple wants to leave, since the house rental was paid for in advance. The house owner isn’t reachable and isn’t answering messages.
At first, Diego and Will think the best thing to do is play Rock Paper Scissors, with the winner of two out of three games getting to stay at the house. Cin suggests that all four of them stay at the house, which is big enough for four people. Cin says that if things get weird, or if anyone feels uncomfortable, they can go back to the idea of playing the Rock Paper Scissors game to decide which couple will stay at the house.
From the get-go, Will shows that he’s the biggest troublemaker of the group. It’s his idea to break into the locked rooms in the house. In one room, the couples find bondage gear and sex toys. In another room, they find occult objects, such as a Ouija board.
Both couples have heard the story of how Bone Lake got its name: In the 1950s, a wealthy couple bought a lot of property in the area. Dozens of skeletons were later found washed up on the land. The theory was that the skeletons were originally in the lake, and that’s how these remains ended up on the land.
Meanwhile, a more recent mystery has happened in the Bone Lake area: A married couple named Robert and Marilyn Price went missing 15 years ago. You can bet that this information has a lot to do with what happens later in the movie.
In the lead-up to the terror scenes, “Bone Lake” shows that Cin and Will like to play mind games that will test the relationship between Sage and Diego. When Diego confides in Will that he plans to propose to Sage during this trip, Will tells Diego that Will has similar marriage proposal plans for Cin during this trip. Diego and Will agree to schedule their proposals at certain times and in different places so the proposals won’t be awkward.
“Bone Lake” has a “slow burn” buildup to the inevitable showdown between the “heroes” and the “villains.” There’s some sexual activity that causes jealousies and tempers to flare. Cin tries to put a temptress wedge between Diego and Sage, by planting suspicions in the minds of Sage and Diego while openly flirting with Diego when they’re alone together. Roe and Hassan fare the best in how they portray their characters. Nechita is a little too “over the top” in some scenes, while Pigossi gives the stiffest acting performance in the cast.
Because “Bone Lake” already telegraphs very early on in the story which couple is the problematic couple, there’s no real mystery in that regard. However, the movie does eventually show the villains’ motives and what the targeted couple does about the situation. “Bone Lake” is an uncomplicated horror movie that is more unsettling than scary. If viewers don’t mind watching a movie where most of the action doesn’t happen until the last third of the movie, then “Bone Lake” should be satisfying enough for anyone looking for some harrowing thrills.
Bleecker Street released “Bone Lake” in U.S. cinemas on October 3, 2025.