The final image of the three generations of women who share the center of “Relic,” Natalie Erika James’s arresting horror debut, isn’t particularly scary. But it’s easily one of the most unsettling, ambiguous and unusual movie tableaus I’ve seen in some time. Notified that her octogenarian mother, Edna (Robyn Nevin), is missing, Kay (Emily Mortimer) and her daughter, Sam (Bella Heathcote), drive to Edna’s large rural home. There, they find disturbing clues of a deteriorating mind, including Post-it notes with reminders to “take pills” and, more ominously, “don’t follow it.” When Edna reappears, refusing to say where she has been, there’s filth under her fingernails and a dark bruise blooming on her breastbone.

Source: New York Times July 09, 2020 10:52 UTC