Nerds That Geek Movie Review: ‘Absence’

Written by Scott Edwards

​Losing someone that is close to you can never be overcome. No matter how many times people ask if you are okay or not, the answer will change so you don’t have to put up with the question anymore. Although your friends and family want to protect you and make sure you are doing well, if they have not lost someone close to them, they will never understand the feeling you have buried down in the pit of your stomach.

After a couple of years of marriage, Liz and Rick are expecting their first born in a few months, but something has gone drastically wrong. Liz winds up in the hospital with no baby in her womb and the doctors are at a loss of what to say. Being questioned about what happened at their home the night before, Rick becomes very protective of his wife and starts to fight everyone off. With all of this being filmed by Evan, Liz’s younger brother, who wants to be a film maker when he graduates college, everyone is on edge and the footage speaks for itself.  

Needing to get away from town for a couple days, as all of the locals are still looking at the family in a strange way since losing their unborn child, Liz, Rick and Evan decide to head up towards their cabin. As Evan is trying to make the best of his time away from school, he will continue to let his camera roll and try to complete his project, although he’s making it a little bit more personal than he previously thought. With Liz being his best friend and the woman that raised him since he was twelve, he is worried about her and tries to add some levity to the situation, but still continues to ask her the tough questions on film.

As the three head out to the deck on their second night in the cabin, they notice a strange light in the sky that they cannot explain and on a walk by the lake, they start to see strange evidence of something happening there last night. With fish being driven out of the lake and burn marks on the ground with no reasonable explanation, they take a look but think nothing of what might really be going on. On the third night in the cabin, a strange sound comes blaring through the area and all of the lights in the house go dark for no reason. Without any explanation about what is happening, the shape of a person is spotted outside of the cabin door trying to get in. When it can be confirmed that it was nobody in the group, jokes are made about what legendary animals it could be, but there is something strange happening outside of the cabin and Evan needs to find out what it is.

I know what I was thinking was going to happen once the family said they were going to get away from the city and go to their cabin, and I was right. Although, this is not a run of the mill alien abduction movie, since there only seems to be one person really being pinpointed by the unseen visitors. These are the movies I like to watch as they leave a lot up to the imagination and you are left to put some of the pieces together. Sometimes I like that way of film making, other times I don’t. I think this just caught me in the right mood. With a ton of jokes coming from Evan, it is a challenge not to smile even though there are some very serious issues going on. I especially liked how the story line played out with the three, as there seems to be a little bit of hate between them, but when all of the cards are put on the table, there is love and respect that you never would have expected. Stay Scared.

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