Review: ‘All the Lost Ones,’ starring Jasmine Mathews, Douglas Smith, Vinessa Antoine, Lochlyn Munro, Matthew Finlan, Anthony Grant, Sheila McCarthy and Devon Sawa

May 22, 2025

by Carla Hay

Douglas Smith, Jasmine Mathews and Vinessa Antoine in “All the Lost Ones” (Photo courtesy of Epic Pictures)

“All the Lost Ones”

Directed by Mackenzie Donaldson

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in the United States, the dramatic film “All the Lost Ones” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some black people) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A group of left-wing, racially diverse environmentalists fight for survival during an apocalypse in which a right-wing, white-supremacist militia group has taken over the northeast part of the nation.

Culture Audience: “All the Lost Ones” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in apocalyptic movies, no matter how ridiculous the stories are.

Jasmine Mathews in “All the Lost Ones” (Photo courtesy of Epic Pictures)

“All the Lost Ones” is the title of this frustrating movie but could also describe the plot points that lose their way. This apocalyptic drama, which takes place during an environmental crisis, is a mess of contradictions, plot holes and hokey acting. “All the Lost Ones” is certainly not the only movie about people on opposite sides of the political spectrum who battle for survival and control during an apocalypse. The problem with “All the Lost Ones” is that the movie sets up this intriguing concept, but then constantly sidelines and undermines it with nonsensical action scenes, corny dialogue and sloppy film editing.

Directed by Mackenzie Donaldson, “All the Lost Ones” was written by Anthony Grant and Cheryl Meyer. The movie seems to have the intention of being a provocative commentary on what can happen when people are dealing with not only a climate-change apocalypse but also a civil war. However, the reasons for the sociopolitical divides are ultimately superficial gimmicks that come and go in the story. Most of “All the Lost Ones” consists of poorly staged chase scenes and a mopey pregnant woman wondering why people who are close to her keep dying.

“All the Lost Ones” takes place in an unspecified 21st century period of time in an unnamed city in United States. The movie was actually filmed in Canada, in the Ontario cities of North Bay and Mattawa. The crisis depicted in “All the Lost Ones” wants to trigger images and memories of how the COVID-19 pandemic spawned political battles over wearing masks and getting vaccines. But so much of the crisis in “All the Lost Ones” gets lost in the shuffle of distracting subplots and baffling erasures of crucial things that would be at the forefront of people’s minds if they’re trying to survive the apocalypse that’s described in the movie.

The beginning of “All the Lost Ones” shows a news montage reporting that thousands of people have died from contaminated tap water. Protestors (most of whom are left-wing liberals) who want the controversial Clean Water Bill to be passed into law have occupied the U.S. Capitol building. A right-wing militia group called the United Conservancy opposes the bill because the United Conservancy says that the Clean Water Bill violates people’s right to choose what type of water they want to drink.

The death toll rises. A caption on screen reads, “Six months later, the United Conservancy has occupied a large portion of the North Eastern Seaboard. Groups of civilians find themselves in hiding, torn between two sides of a civil war.” “All the Lost Ones” gives no explanation for how a fringe militia group was able to invade and take over the northeast part of the nation without the U.S. military still not putting up a fight. That’s not a huge issue for the movie, which doesn’t have flashbacks, but it’s the first indication that the movie’s flimsy plot brings up questions that are never answered.

“All the Lost Ones” focuses on a specific group of eight environmental protestors, who are part of a now-scattered community of “resistors.” During the United Conservancy takeover, these eight fugitives have been hiding away at a well-kept, two-story lake house. The synopsis of the movie describes this hideaway dwelling as a “cabin.” It’s not a cabin. It’s a contemporary lake house that’s large enough for eight people to live.

If these resistors are living in discomfort and extreme fear, or are trying to lay low by not calling attention to themselves, you wouldn’t know it from the first time they’re seen on screen. They are having a house party, where they’re playing music and dancing, as if they don’t have any worries. It’s a very strange way to start the movie, after viewers are told that there’s a civil war that has led to a rogue military invasion, there’s a pandemic from contaminated water, and the death toll is rising.

These are the eight people in this group of resistors:

  • Nia (played by Jasmine Mathews), the moody chief protagonist who is conflicted about being a fugitive in hiding, finds out during the story that she is pregnant.
  • Ethan (played by Douglas Smith), Nia’s sensitive boyfriend, is more certain than Nia that he wants to settle down and get married.
  • Penny (played by Vinessa Antoine), Nia’s practical-minded older sister, is a medical doctor who used to work as a radiologist before the apocalypse happened.
  • Mikael Allen (played by Steven Ogg) wants to be the “alpha male” of the group to make leadership decisions.
  • Raymond Allen (played by “All the Lost Ones” co-writer Grant), nicknamed Ray, is Mikael’s easygoing cousin.
  • Nancy Allen (played by Kim Roberts) is Raymond’s nurturing mother and Mikael’s aunt.
  • Dawn (played by Sheila McCarthy) has a calm personality and is good at planning.
  • Jacob (played by Matthew Finlan) is Dawn’s outgoing 18-year-old son.

“All the Lost Ones” has such underdeveloped characters, the movie never reveals what anyone in this group (except for Nia) did for a living before the apocalypse. This background information wouldn’t have to be told in flashbacks. It could just be briefly mentioned and would go a long way in explaining who in this group has any particular skills or job experience that could be helpful to their survival.

During the house party, everyone seems to be having a great time. Mikael even gives a drinking toast to say that the party is to celebrate their “six-month anniversary.” But viewers might be wondering, “What’s there to celebrate about going into hiding from an extremist militia group?”

Not everyone at the party remains in a festive mood. Nia goes into the bathroom to vomit. And when a woman of child-bearing age vomits in a movie, it’s usually because she’s intoxicated or pregnant. Nia is not intoxicated. Penny notices that Nia isn’t feeling well, but Nia denies that she’s having any health issues.

During this party, observant viewers will notice that all of the partygoers are drinking out of open plastic cups. Each cup is taped with a piece of paper that has the name of the person who’s holding the cup. What is the purpose of having their plastic cups labeled? Don’t expect the movie to answer that question.

This environmental crisis is about contaminated tap water, not keeping track of who is using what cup, as if they’re afraid of being drugged. Labeling the cups with individual names is also a pointless tactic because an open plastic cup isn’t exactly secure if it’s set down somewhere and could easily be contaminated if someone wanted to contaminate what’s in the cup. It’s yet another example of the movie’s disconnect from logic.

And this is where the logic continues to fall off the rails: For unexplained reasons, during this party, Nia decides now would be a good time to strip down to her underwear and swim in the lake. If you’re in the middle of a pandemic where people are dying from contaminated tap water, the last thing you should want to do is jump in water that is the source of tap water, such as lakes, rivers or reservoirs.

But time and time again, there are scenes in “All the Lost Ones” where people jump in unfiltered and unsanitary bodies of water, with no mention or concern about the water contamination crisis. And keep in mind, these are the same “resistors” who believe that the Clean Water Bill should’ve been passed into law. You’d never know it from the hypocritical and counterproductive ways in which they are acting.

Nia’s impromptu swim is interrupted by the horror of seeing a dead young man in the lake. The movie doesn’t give a clear look at the man, but he looks like he has a bullet hole in the middle of his head. Nia is understandably frightened as she rushes out of the lake. Other people at the party see the floating corpse too.

“Did you see his eyes?” an alarmed Nia asks Penny. It turns out that this dead man’s eyes have been removed. Don’t expect an explanation for that either. The dead man is never seen or mentioned again. This is the movie’s clumsy way of showing that in this apocalyptic world, you could get murdered by gun violence and could end up a corpse floating in a lake without anyone caring to find out who you are because they’re too busy celebrating that they’ve spent six months successfully hiding from the extremist militia group that has taken over the region.

All of this means that it’s only a matter of time before “All the Lost Ones” devolves into a series of chase scenes with shootouts. The resistors are armed with mostly rifles and shotguns, but there is no mention of how they are able to refill the supply of ammunition that they use. There are some almost-laughable scenes where some of the resistors waste their ammunition on lousy-aim gun shots.

Before the shootouts and chase scenes happen, “All the Lost Ones” has some awkward and poorly written scenes that show a few of the romantic entanglements in this group of resistors. During the party, there’s a weirdly toned scene of Jacob and Penny flirting with each other and being touchy-feely, as if they’re sexually attracted to each other. Penny is old enough to be the mother of barely legal Jacob, so this scene looks out-of-place and a little creepy.

Why is Penny acting like she wants teenage Jacob to be her next boyfriend? Don’t expect the movie to answer that question either. There is no personal background or context for the main characters’ personal relationships, although the movie eventually shows who and where Jacob’s father is.

Meanwhile, “All the Lost Ones” has some dull scenes of Nia being pouty with Ethan because she openly expresses doubts about her decision to join Ethan in hiding. Nia tells anyone who listens that she feels guilty and helpless for hiding out when she believes she has an obligation to be fighting in the civil war that’s currently raging. Based on Nia’s inept fighting skills and bad decisions in protecting people around her, she’s better off staying in hiding.

To be clear: “All the Lost Ones” isn’t a real war movie that has massive bombings, air combat or extensive military operations. “All the Lost Ones” is a movie that looks like it’s about a bunch of progressive liberals fighting to survive in a wooded lake area while they are being hunted by a rampaging, ragtag group of white supremacist militia people. In case it isn’t clear that United Conservancy members are white supremacist racists, there’s a Nazi flag proudly displayed in one of the member’s homes.

The United Conservancy members who hunt down the resistors are led by a snarling redneck type named Conrad (played by Devon Sawa), who looks like he stepped out of a doomsday prepper recruitment video. Also part of the United Conservancy are “angry dad” Hank (played Lochlyn Munro) and his teenage son Wyatt (played by Alexander Elliot), who has better aim in his gun shooting than almost all of the adults. And lest you think that United Conservancy only has male fighters, there’s a teenage girl named Ripley (played by Stefani Kimber), who’s part of the group, although she is literally a token female.

During this pandemic where thousands of people are dying from contaminated tap water, “All the Lost Ones” doesn’t show anyone actually dying from contaminated tap water. A clever movie with this subject matter would have shown how bottled and filtered water has become a precious resource that is highly sought-after and exploited for profits. But you get none of that in “All the Lost Ones,” which spends the entire movie acting like contaminated water isn’t a life-or-death danger, even though the contaminated water was the catalyst for this apocalyptic pandemic and this civil war.

Before the violent mayhem starts, there’s a scene where Nia, Dawn and Raymond walk to an abandoned part of the city to look for food and supplies. They go inside a general store, where Nia finds a pregnancy kit. Nia takes a pregnancy test to confirm what she suspected: She’s pregnant.

Nia later tells Ethan, who seems more thrilled about the pregnancy than Nia is because Nia seems to want to be some kind of heroic social justice warrior fighting for The Cause, and motherhood might derail those plans. By the way, Mathews and Smith aren’t very believable as a couple in love. And so, the movie fails at the one romance featured in the story.

There are some rats scurrying around this abandoned store. Raymond hands a mouse trap to Nia and tells her to set the trap because they need rats for their group’s next meal. Wait a minute: These are the same people who just a day or two before were partying like they didn’t have any big worries. And now they’re supposed to be so starved for food, they have to resort to eating rats. The contradictions in this movie start to become very annoying.

The acting performances in “All the Lost Ones” become grating and are made worse by some of the insipid dialogue. There’s a scene where Nia and Penny are in the lake (there they go again, being in possibly contaminated water), as they’re trying to hide from United Conservancy gunmen. Penny has been wounded by a gunshot and questions Nia for putting her pregnancy in jeopardy by trying to hold Penny afloat in the lake. Nia quips, “My body, my choice.” Apparently, we’re supposed to believe that when you’re about to be hunted by raging militia extremists, it helps to quote slogans that you see at pro-choice rallies.

Possibly the only thing that “All the Lost Ones” gets right is composer Trevor Yuile’s music score, which is very effective at creating tension in the scenes that need it. Some of the movie’s cinematography is good, but not consistently so. Ulimately, with a weak and contradictory story, mediocre-to-bad acting, and terrible action scenes, “All the Lost Ones” is an apocalyptic movie that sinks faster than a rock in the movie’s lake.

Epic Pictures released “All the Lost Ones” in select U.S. cinemas on April 18, 2025. The movie was released on digital and VOD on April 22, 2025.

Review: ‘The Sinners’ (2021), starring Kaitlyn Bernard, Brenna Coates, Brenna Llewellyn, Aleks Paunovic, Lochlyn Munro, Michael Eklund and Tahmoh Penikett

February 19, 2021

by Carla Hay

Brenna Llewellyn, Natalie Malaika, Keilani Elizabeth Rose, Jasmine Randhawa, Kaitlyn Bernard, Brenna Coates and Carly Fawcett in “The Sinners.” (Photo courtesy of Brainstorm Media)

“The Sinners” (2021)

Directed by Courtney Paige

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed North American city, the horror flick “The Sinners” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few people of color) representing the middle-class and working-class.

Culture Clash: In a conservative Christian town, seven teenage girls form a cult-like clique where they each represent the seven deadly sins, and then members of the group start getting murdered.

Culture Audience: “The Sinners” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in independent horror films that are suspenseful and make the most out of their low budgets.

A scene from “The Sinners.” Pictured in front row, from left to right: Carly Fawcett, Kaitlyn Bernard and Natalie Malaika. Pictured in second row, from left to right: Jasmine Randhawa, Keilani Elizabeth Rose, Brenna Coates and Brenna Llewellyn. (Photo courtesy of Brainstorm Media)

Before anyone dismisses “The Sinners” as just another horror movie where a bunch of teenagers get murdered, consider that it skillfully takes on religious bigotry and sexual oppression while balancing it with an intriguing mystery, gruesome horror and even some touches of comedy. It’s not an easy balancing act, but “The Sinners” mostly succeeds in being a memorable independent horror film in a sea of mindless slasher flicks.

“The Sinners” is the feature-film directorial debut of Courtney Paige, who wrote the screenplay with Erin Hazlehurst and Madison Smith. Paige is also an actress, which might explain why the casting is better than most low-budget movies of this type. Some of the acting is amateurish, but the dynamics between the actors look more authentic and natural than a lot of horror movies that could care less about character development or chemistry between the actors.

The story of “The Sinners” centers on a clique of seven girls who are classmates in their last year at a Christian high school in an unnamed city in North America. (The movie was actually filmed in Paige’s Canadian hometown of Kelowna, British Columbia.) These teenagers call themselves The Sins, and they have each assigned themselves to represent one of the seven deadly sins. They are:

  • Grace Carver (played by Kaitlyn Bernard), the group’s assertive blonde leader, represents the sin of lust. It’s ironic because Grace, who is the child of a strict pastor, is a virgin, but she has a secret love that’s considered taboo in her religion.
  • Tori Davidson (played by Brenna Coates), who sometimes dresses as an emo or Goth, represents the sin of wrath. She’s the tough-talking rebel of the group, and she’s in a secretive romance with Grace.
  • Katie Hamilton (played by Keilani Elizabeth Rose), who is very spoiled and materialistic, represents the sin of greed. She likes to make others feel inferior by bragging about what her wealth can buy her.
  • Molly McIvor (played by Carli Fawcett), a compulsive eater, represents the sin of gluttony. She is very self-conscious about her looks because she’s not as thin as the other girls in the group.
  • Robyn Pearce (played by Natalie Malaika), a passive follower, represents the sin of sloth. She wants to go to a good college but is too lazy to study, so she cheats instead.
  • Stacey Rodgers (played by Jasmine Randhawa), who often compares herself to other people, represents the sin of envy. Her loyalty depends on what she can get out of it.
  • Aubrey Miller (played by Brenna Llewellyn), a quiet redhead who becomes a target for the others’ bullying, represents the sin of pride. The other members of the Sins turn on Aubrey when Grace decides that Aubrey is a snitch.

Aubrey is the narrator of the movie, which opens with a scene of Aubrey being kidnapped by the other Sins, who are wearing masks. This kidnapping ends up being the catalyst for much of the horror that happens in the last third of the film, when certain members of the Sins are murdered, one by one. This isn’t a slasher film where the murderer is revealed from the beginning. There are several people who could be suspects.

Out of all the members of the Sins, Grace is the one whose home life is shown the most. She lives with her parents and three siblings in a very oppressive and religious home ruled over by her father Pastor Dean Carver (played by Tahmoh Penikett), who demands that everything has to be done his way. Grace’s mother Brenda Carver (played by Loretta Walsh) is passive, but she has compassion and often acts as a peacemaker when Dean and Grace get into arguments.

Grace’s older sister Hannah (played by Karis Cameron) sometimes shares Grace’s tendency to be sarcastic and rebellious. By contrast, their younger teenage brother Luke Carver (played by Maxwell Haynes) wants to be the family’s “goody-two-shoes” child and is ready to tattle on Grace and Hannah to their father if he sees them doing anything wrong. The youngest child in the family is a baby boy, who’s briefly seen in the movie and whose name is not mentioned.

At the beginning of the movie, Grace has broken up with a fellow student named Kit Anderson (played by Dylan Playfair), who is still pining for Grace because he keeps calling her and trying to get back together with her. Some of the students, including the other members of the Sins, are aware that Grace and Tori are more than friends. However, Kit is in denial that Grace could be a member of the LGBTQ community and ignores the rumors that are swirling about Grace’s sexuality.

Grace and Tori have to keep their romance a secret, because they go to a religious high school (where all the students wear uniforms and have classes where they study the Bible) and they live in a very conservative Christian community. Tori and Grace canoodle in bathroom stalls at school, and their study sessions in Grace’s bedroom have some snuggling and kissing. Grace’s pastor father doesn’t really approve of Tori, who’s the type of student who will get sent to the principal’s office for blurting out impatiently in class: “Jesus, are you done?”

Grace’s father also doesn’t really approve of Grace’s part-time after-school job working at a flower stand called Andy’s Flower Stream. The business, which operates out of an Airstream trailer, is owned by a bohemian type named Andy Lund (played by James Neate), who’s a laid-back and friendly boss. Andy lives in the trailer with his hippie-ish girlfriend Summer Dobson (played by Jen Araki), who encourages Grace to walk in bare feet and feel “love and light.”

In a voiceover, Aubrey says about Summer, who used to be Aubrey’s babysitter: “I always had a creepy feeling about her. You know the people who always claim ‘light and love and positive.’ Well, they’re usually the most broken.” But the person Aubrey dislikes the most is Tori, because she thinks Tori is a hateful bully.

The top law enforcement official in town is Sherriff Fred Middleton (played by Aleks Paunovic), who provides some of the movie’s comic relief because he tries to be imposing but he’s really kind of a goofball. He’s first seen in the movie when he shows up in the empty classroom where his wife Maggie Middleton (played by Elysia Rotaru) is a teacher at the high school. (Maggie is also Andy’s sister.)

Maggie walks in the classroom and tells Fred, as she unbuttons her blouse, that they have nine minutes before the students arrive for the next class. Fred and Maggie, who’ve been trying to start a family, end up having quickie sex in the classroom. It’s played for laughs because Aubrey, who sees Fred leave the classroom and guesses what he had been doing there, asks him what he has on his collar. He quickly looks to see if a stain is there (there isn’t) and figures out that Aubrey was just trying to embarrass him when she tells him that she tried to go into the classroom but the door was locked.

Aubrey keeps a journal of her innermost thoughts. And all hell breaks loose when Tori and Kathy steal Aubrey’s journal. Certain incidents lead the other Sins to believe that Aubrey has been snitching on them. And when they find out what Aubrey has to say about them in the journal, their suspicions seem to be confirmed.

First, they lure Aubrey into a “study group” session which turns out to be an excuse to harass and haze her. Then, they kidnap Aubrey and take her to a remote wooded area, where things spiral out of control, but Aubrey manages to escape and goes missing. And then, other members of the Sins start to disappear and are brutally murdered.

Sheriff Middleton and his Deputy Douglas Sanders (played by Taylor St. Pierre) end up clashing with the higher-level government detectives who are sent to investigate the murders. The outside investigators are Detective Zankowski (played Michael Eklund) and Detective O’Ryan (played by Lochlyn Munro), who treat the sheriff and the deputy like incompetent yokels. Middleton and Sanders think that they’re being undermined by arrogant big-city types who don’t know the community. Meanwhile, as these two factions have their power struggle, more of the Sins get killed.

“The Sinners” makes great use of cinematography by Stirling Bancroft to create an atmosphere of foreboding beneath the pristine and orderly exterior of this suburban community. (There’s a recurring image of a rose stuck in the mouth of dead girl that’s particularly striking. It’s probably why the move was originally titled “The Color Rose.”) The movie’s production design and costume design are well-done, given the film’s small budget. And the whodunit aspect of the mystery is not as predictable as viewers might think it is.

There’s only one scene in the movie that seems awkward and out-of-place. It involves Grace having a secret occult meeting with two women and one man who look at least 10 years older than she is. It’s never explained how a sheltered preacher’s kid like Grace came to find these people or how long she’s known them. And the scene ends up being irrelevant, given what happens at the end of the movie.

The actresses who portray the seven Sins are convincing as a pack of “mean girls” who are “frenemies,” with their loyalty to each other always in question. As Tori, Coates stands out with having the most realistic acting and also the most obviously complicated character. On the one hand, Tori is exactly the type of bully that Aubrey despises. On the other hand, Tori has a very tough-but-tender side to her that’s loving with Grace and very protective of her. Their secret romance adds another layer of terror and anxiety in the story, since the unforgiving homophobia in their community makes Grace and Tori afraid to be open about the true nature of their relationship.

“The Sinners” is definitely not a horror classic on the level of director David Fincher’s 1995 film “Seven,” another macabre thriller with the seven deadly sins as its theme. As far as slasher films go, “The Sinners” can be considered slightly better than most. And it’s also a promising feature directorial debut for Paige, who shows she has a knack for telling a gripping horror story in a way that can capture people’s interest from beginning to end.

Brainstorm Media released “The Sinners” on digital and VOD on February 19, 2021.

UPDATE: Lifetime will premiere the movie under the title “The Virgin Sinners” on August 21, 2021.

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