My quick rating – 4.8/10. We open on what appears to be a lakeside mansion slowly smoldering away, accompanied by the faint sound of a woman’s scream. So, yeah, things seem to have gone slightly off the rails. Then Bury the Devil jumps back 75 minutes to find out exactly how we got there.

Evelyn (Dawn Ford) is an elderly woman being cared for by Sarah (Isabella Gonzalez), a hospice nurse looking after her during a rather unpleasant thunderstorm. Evelyn brushes her hair while Sarah tends to her, and before long it becomes apparent that dementia may not be the only thing Sarah has to worry about.

Ford is the standout here. Her performance as Evelyn basically makes the movie. There is something genuinely unsettling about watching her switch between moments of vulnerability and something more sinister. Gonzalez holds her own alongside her and even manages to sneak in a little humor, which is welcome because this is a very dark movie.

And I mean that literally.

The entire movie takes place inside this enormous mansion during a thunderstorm, so the lighting is appropriately moody and atmospheric. Unfortunately, there were also times when I was wondering what exactly I was looking at. The darkness absolutely fits the movie, but sometimes it feels like the house swallowed the cinematographer.

Writer/director Adam O’Brien doesn’t spend much time getting bogged down in mythology or complicated explanations. The basic pitch is essentially – here is a possessed old woman, she’s dangerous, and let’s see what happens. There are a few ideas tossed into the mix, but they never really come together into anything substantial.

Then, about an hour in, I realized something else. This appears to be playing out as one continuous take. Surprisingly, it works.

Once I noticed it, I started paying more attention to it, but I never found myself trying to pick apart every transition. It felt natural enough that the technique became part of the experience rather than the entire experience. Considering the movie was shot in just six days, I’m guessing there weren’t exactly unlimited opportunities for everyone to say, “Let’s do that again.”

There are a couple of genuinely cool moments, including that opening shot of the burning mansion and one particularly nasty throat-ripping scene. And yes, that image from the poster? Yep. When it happens, it is every bit as spooky as you were hoping.

Unfortunately, some of the kills happen off-screen, which takes a little of the fun out of things, and the story ultimately doesn’t come together as well as I’d hoped.

Still, Bury the Devil gets a lot out of its simple premise, largely because Ford absolutely commits to Evelyn. There isn’t a deep supernatural mythology to uncover here. It’s mostly a crazed older woman, a nurse trying to survive the night, and a mansion that really needs better lighting.

Ending on the same scene that opened the movie was also a nice touch.