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15 year old Cassie (Alexa Mechling) has died under her older sister
Clara's (Ava Psoras) watch, who has taken care of her ever since ever
since their father Victor (Joel Fishel) has left them and their mum (Betsy
Lynn George) has died - and even though Cassie's death was an accident,
Clara feels responsible. It's at Cassie's wake and funeral that Victor
tries to come back into Clara's life, but Clara won't have it - only to a
few days later find out he's terminally ill, and before you know it, he
dies too. But Clara has other problems as it seems, as Cassie and her
mother seem to lure her to the land of the death - and the problem here is
Clara doesn't know whether their lures are real or not, or whether
reality's real, heck, even whether her suicidal tendencies are real.
Eventually, Clara starts investigating, and finds out about a very dark
family secret - and now she has to wonder if knowing about it is actually
helping or hurting her ... Now Occurrence at Mills Creek
isn't your typical straightforward shocker, it has layers upon layers of
reality stacked upon one another, doesn't always tell things in a
chronological order, and at times even seems to contradict itself and lie
to the audience - and all this is why Occurrence at Mills Creek is
such a strong movie, because it doesn't look for easy answers, because it
doesn't try to explain things away, because it does leave it to the
audience to make up their own story, fill the (intentional) gaps with
their own imagination. And while the direction seems to drift through the
different narrative layers at ease and adds an atmosphere of unease to the
proceedings, grounded performances by all involved make this one work
rather beautifully.
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