The best way to describe The Mooring is Wrong Turn but with non-inbreds and Joy Ride but with boats. Is this something you could see yourself dropping a couple bucks on? Read my review to find out if it’s really worth the money.
Title: The Mooring
Director: Glenn Withrow
Writers: Glenn Withrow, Hallie Todd, and Ivy Withrow
Noteworthy Cast: Hallie Todd (“Lizzie McGuire”), Thomas Brown (“Knotts Landing”)
Run Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes
“In northern Idaho, a group of teenage girls attended a summer camp to help them connect with nature without technology. They were told it would be a summer of change. As the girls’ houseboat is suddenly stranded in the middle of the river an odd couple comes to their aid. What was suppose to be an act of kindness turns deadly as the girls find themselves on the run, being pursued through the forest by a brutal and determined killer.” — Lionsgate
Right off the bat I really want to applaud this movie for its unique ability to cast actresses who actually fit the role. The Mooring is fronted by a group of young women who don’t have a ton of acting experience and more importantly they actually look like 15/16/17 year old girls. No Hollywood starlets that you can’t relate to and no 27-year-old “it girl” trying to play a high schooler. It’s this quality that makes The Mooring worth watching. The believable casting choices lead you to care about the girls on screen and then it makes you route for them. All of the girls delivered stellar performances and I was saddened to see any of them die.
The Mooring is also very theme heavy. The addiction to technology is obviously the main theme, but team work, defying the odds, fight vs flight, and trust are major themes depicted in The Mooring too. The film as a whole is much more about building a story, progressing characters, and touching the viewer – even though this is a horror movie. With that fact being known, you can’t expect a lot of gore out of this title. Almost all of the death’s occure off screen or are cut aways. You don’t see any nudity or sex either. Again, The Mooring is more about the journey than the slaughter.
I thoroughly enjoyed this title and would definitely recommend it to any horror fan, especially those who like a good story mixed in with their violence and suspense. Despite my overall pleasurable viewing, I’m going to give The Mooring a 7.5 out of 10 because it cheated me out of a proper ending.
