At the start of the film, three people are having dinner in a lonely wooden cabin, far away from civilization. But first, as a tradition, they bow their heads and say grace in unison. Not to the Creator though, but to their cabin, which they have named Lazareth after a biblical figure. Lee (Ashley Judd) regarding the cabin as the provider. “the cabin not only gives us protection, food, water and home. It is more than just a place, it is an idea, a world within a world”.
That’s the only world they have, it appears to the audience as we hear Lee relate to Maeve and Imogen how life was before Lazareth; “there had been towns and cities and there had been so many who spent their lives in the slumber of time”. But a pandemic came and managed to break down the systems. All the sick perished, and the healthy transformed into something primitive.
In the movie Lukaz Zapan, Lee, a nurse, has survived the world after a devastating virus pandemic and believes she can survive longer and protect the young girls being raised in a camp for such survivors. Lee returns to the safety of a zoomed in beam of candle light surrounded by remote keepsakes such as photographs to fuel emotions but that gets ruined as the risk of danger continuously looms “outside” the camp because the world is chaotic. For the sake of safety, whether from an unexpected stalker or a situational accident, Lee completely protects herself from the outside by hiding herself under a protective clothing and mask that Zara eventually ends up tossing out and burning, although in a world filled with danger, there is no choice but to wander out in shields fully. Lee endures those carting around wwii horror stories about women and is completely dependable on planning every aspect imaginable that would endanger the girls including allowing them only the knowledge that, for now, it is futile to go outside and look for beautiful sights.
The first is the perpetual conflict of all parents and caregivers: to protect their children from fear and sadness, a situation that is worsened here by the post apocalyptic terror that the virus, as well as other remaining humans may pose. Lee desires for the girls to be frightened enough not to want to leave Lazareth, but to feel relatively safe and secure as long as they are with her at Lazareth.
The second is the thin shield of civilization that we all safety nest under. The small group humans that remained of the virus had reserve to whatever that required to live. Lee narrates, “Mother Nature gave them a reality check and now they are scavengers,” she says. Some will we see survive by what they can steal from others while some will survive by the protection of others from stealing.
That refers to Lee. Part of the exposition involves a maniacal woman who reaches the cabin while holding a photo of kids and asking for food. Right when she is about to hand out a couple of cans, Lee spots the girl scratch her shoulder a bit too casually an indication she has the disease and is infectious. Lee does not hesitate and shoots her without even a moment of thinking.
It is not only external factors that pose problems in protecting the youth. Adolescence itself is equally risky, the third theme of the film. Imogene and Maeve are first portrayed as young children, the two are then cast as teenagers Katie Douglas and Sarah Pidgeon respectively for most of the movie. When they learn about a wounded teenager called Owen (Asher Angel from ‘Shazam’), the two teens begin to explore themes of rebellion and attraction towards each other. They manage to ‘save’ him in Lazareth, who is good looking, and they start cleaning his side cut now encompassed by their fascination.
The sequences involving threat and faced off are pretty suspenseful deviant and eerie without an interpretative showering. In earlier scenes, there are encouraging households sounds when it is barely lighted inside the cabin and the floors ‘creek’ from the wood, ‘spine ironic’ when the setting is being prepared for the pursuit of vicious marauders.
There is an essence in the films atmosphere which is palpable; in an instance the audience identifies with the story and engages, however both the producer and star Judd and the writer and director Alec Tibaldi are sincere to the theme but not much in depth attention was paid.This film is proud to declare that its intention, meaning and values are far from the realm of arguments, analysis or anything, frankly, illuminating and rhetorically impressive. Rather the film is about sensibilities.
For more movies like Lazareth visit 123Movies.