The Lair was directed by Neil Marshall, a British genre filmmaker. Marshall made a bit of a splash in the early to mid-2000s with the film Dog Soldiers, and his best film is The Descent. He then made a name for himself on TV by directing two of the most famous Game of Thrones episodes, plus episodes of shows like Hannibal, Westworld, and Constantine, all high-quality genre TV shows. It seemed like he might have a bit of a Hollywood career, but he ended up being hired to direct the ill-fated Hellboy reboot. Nobody liked it—there are few films I’ve walked out of recent years, and this was one of them. Even the filmmakers behind it have said it was not a pleasant experience, no one was happy: not the cast, the crew or the fans. Marshall ended up publicly disowning the film.
After that experience, Marshall went back to his roots and made two small-budget horror movies, The Reckoning and The Lair. Both were picked up by Shudder, where his first two films had been staples. The Lair combines elements of Dog Soldiers and The Descent, and I think it’s an alright film. A female British Air Force pilot, Capt. Kate Sinclair (Charlotte Kirk), is shot down over Afghanistan, and finds refuge from the Taliban in an abandoned underground bunker. There she comes face to face with alien-esque creatures who have now been awakened. A special team of SAS troops have been sent to find her and get her out. She escapes, where she finds a nearby American army base, where she meets Major Roy Finch (Jamie Bamber). The creatures end up coming out of their lair, and they’ve got to fight them off.
There’s a bit of The Thing, a bit of Alien—it’s derivative, but if you’re going to rip something off, those movies are great source material to steal. It’s a decent ‘80s-throwback film with Marshall reprising some of his greatest hits and some quite good practical effects. The aliens for the most part are clearly men in suits, which is sadly not done that often these days, and I kind of liked that aspect. The story itself is pretty derivative and the dialogue is sub-John Carpenter, plus there are some quite corny accents. There’s also some relatively bad CGI that needed some more work. The design of the lair itself was actually pretty cool and you get a sense of vast space when she drops a light down to see how far the ladder goes. The supporting characters are far more interesting than the lead actress, especially Major Finch. So while it might be a little generic, it’s an enjoyable ride despite being nothing special.
The disc also includes a very short making-of featurette.
★★★
Ian Schultz
psychotroniccinema.com 