Jeremy LaLonde and Jonas Chernick‘s new collaboration (after 2019’s James Vs His Future Self) opens with a hauntingly familiar audio overlay of a news interview discussing viruses, vaccines, science journals, and death rates. This is then juxtaposed with visuals of isolated scenery and closeups of water – the conduit for this alternative reality’s pandemic – and immediately signals that this is no typical big-budget, global scale ‘virus movie’.
Setting the audience up with an apparent flashforward to protagonist Jennifer’s (Amanda Brugel) vaccine breakthrough, the film then cuts to her waking from a blackout. She is ordered by a doctor to take a break from work, encouraged by partner Jason, and reluctantly agrees to spend a weekend at the eponymous Ashgrove – a sequestered farmhouse in the country. Despite the idyllic setting, though, there is an omnipresent undercurrent of menace. The film’s murky colour palette, pregnant pauses in dialogue, and unsettling nightmare montages create an uneasy feeling of deception and mystery.
What becomes apparent is that Ashgrove is, at its heart, a tense relationship drama, rather than a sci-fi film. Brugel and Chernick carefully carve out buried conflict between Jennifer and Jason that bubbles to the surface in uncomfortable silences, resentful stares, and turbulent arguments. In fact, the pandemic backdrop is almost incidental. Think Closer as opposed to Contagion. These visceral moments are no doubt a result of the film’s organic creation process: Chernick and director LaLonde devised the nucleus of the story but much of the dialogue and plot was then created on set by the actors as they improvised and experimented, filming the movie in sequence.
A third act twist gradually unclouds many of the film’s oddities and secrets and the piece shifts gear again, revealing itself to be an examination of gaslighting and survival ethics. It asks a utilitarian question – how important is one individual’s suffering when millions of lives are at stake? – and its layers of secrecy continue to unfold themselves, even in the final scene. It’s these shocking blows, alongside careful, detailed performances, that give Ashgrove its impact.
Screening as part of Glasgow Film Festival 2022