“A supernatural drama about grief.” Thanks, IMDB, for the lenghty, well-written synopsis. Although I joke, this one sentence pretty much says it all about Lake Mungo. It really isn’t a horror movie; more of a faux-doc presented like a special you would see on TV after 60 Minutes. That poster suggests there is at least one scene where someone is running for their life, getting attacked by a shark, or at least whipping their hair back whilst skinny dipping. Disappointingly so, there is nothing resembling that amount of emotion or action in this film whatsoever.

If you find the picture above scary in any way, then Lake Mungo might be for you. The ghost is only ever shown in the backgrounds of photos. It doesn’t kill anyone, hell, it doesn’t even harass anyone on-screen. I kept waiting for shit to go nuts but it never happened. The story isn’t bad but it’s not what you would expect from the trailer. I watched the trailer afterwards because it happened to be on the disc and it’s cutting it close to false advertisement.  Just as I suspected, it shows a movie full of excitement and energy, when it is actually a droll and gloomy film. Lake Mungo would be a nice episode of Dateline, maybe, but it is not something I would throw in to a marathon of slashers.

2 creppy photos out of 5

★★☆☆☆