Brackish (2015) Movie Review- Reviving the Dead

Brackish is about a man who has lost his fiancé to traumatic circumstances. In order to take his mind off of things, his sister takes him on a trip to their father’s hometown to camp out. Upon arriving, they are faced with a dangerous cult, tough decisions and the consequences they have. The film asks the question, “If you could bring someone back from the dead, would you?” Sounds interesting, right? Conceptually, it is quite interesting. Did it live up to its potential or did I get left trying to revive myself from Death’s Wasteland?

Brackish starts off promising enough with an intro that rivals the tone of the cult classic, Evil Dead. You are in the middle of the woods in a cabin and a frazzled looking man conveys the feeling that he might have done something regretful. I had hope for Brackish at this point. Unfortunately, as the film dragged on, I realized watching it was like playing a slot machine that you just keep losing on. There are many reasons why Brackish gave me this feeling and I will try to explain them in the most constructive way that I can.

The audio in Brackish is incredibly hard to discern for the majority of the film, especially when there is dialogue and background music at the same time. I have seen this style of filming in some web series. It seems as if the audio is cued by someone talking. You can hear the recording feature come on every time someone opens their mouth. The bad thing about this recording tool is that it has an audible hum that tends to drown out what is being said. Add that to an incredibly loud soundtrack and you find yourself attempting to lipread all dialogue.

For a low-budget film, Brackish doesn’t do atrociously bad in the acting department. Unfortunately, the good acting comes from mostly minor roles. The main characters, especially the villain, is so over-the-top it is painful to watch at times. If, due to financial reasons, you can’t produce quality, you should at least be able to produce substance. You need to balance out the bad with the good. Brackish did not successfully do that for me and subsequently left me feeling incredibly disappointed.

Due to Brackish having conceptual potential, I would like to see this team try again in the future. When they do, I hope that they will take an unbiased look at what they have created and make adjustments accordingly. If they do this, I think they could be quite successful in the future. Unfortunately for Brackish, this is not going to be the winner that catapults them to fame. Should you want to form your own opinion, you can rent it digitally online.