THE BODY TREE

Cabin-in-the-woods of the Altai Republic in south-central Siberia

The plot concerns a group of American college students & their professor traveling to the remote area in order to honor their murdered friend in a memorial ceremony. To be expected, all hell breaks loose.

The unique location is a highlight, as is the serious tension that develops as the group desperately tries to discern which member murdered Kara a year earlier.

Dark brunette Erica Dasher rises to the fore on the female front as Alice, but there’s also Emma Dumont (Sandra), blonde Ivanna Sakhno (Helen) and Ana Flavia Gavlak (Kara).

Lastly, there’s a superb closing credits song by Laura Duncan called “Kick the Dust,” which features the refrain “In the daylight of the known” at the end. How stunning songs like this are relegated to the dustbin while, say, Taylor Swift continuously draws millions is a great mystery.

It runs 1h 37m and was shot in summer 2015 at Canyon Ranch, which is located south of Thousand Oaks in the Santa Monica Mountains, northwest of Los Angeles, with drone footage of the Altai Mountains done in Siberia. For those not in the know, the Altai Republic is situated northeast of Kazakhstan and northwest of Mongolia (between the two).

GRADE: B/B-