Marie (Doctor Sleep's Jocelin Donahue) is the daughter of late Hollywood actress Ava Aldrich (Melora Walters). When she learns of the vandalism of her mother's grave, she and partner George Darrow (Joe Swanberg) head towards the isolated island community where her mother is buried.
Arriving there, she is told by the creepy bridge operator (horror stalwart Richard Brake) that the island is about to close down for the winter, raising the sole bridge that connects it to the mainland until the worst of the weather has passed in the spring.
Once on the island, Marie finds herself entangled in a disorientating labyrinth of strange goings-on, unhelpful locals, and general weirdness.
As all this is kicking off, Marie lets slip to George that, on her deathbed, her dementia-addled mother had told her a story of the island, that its original settlers had signed a pact with a demon to protect them from the bad weather that regularly lashes the place.
This being a horror flick, of course, you know that this isn't just the ravings of a sick old woman.
The problem with Offseason - from writer/director Mickey Keating - is the major disconnect between the story, which is certainly solid although not wholly original, and what actually appears onscreen.
Ultimately, the movie is too enigmatic for its own good, hitting the audience with clichés when it could have devoted more time to drip-feeding us clues as to what's really go on.
It's a fine line between mystery and plot hole, and all too often what is meant to be the former actually feels like the latter.
On one hand, Offseason looks gorgeous (with its near-constant Silent Hill-style mists and attractive lead), but there are moments when we ought to be getting a better picture of what's going on, but instead it's hidden in shadow.
The dream-like atmosphere that follows Marie's wanderings around the near-deserted island community doesn't always work, as it often suggests that none of what's happening is real and thus has no real jeopardy.
A visual treat, the 83-minute Offseason owes an awful lot to HP Lovecraft's The Shadow Over Innsmouth as well as the legendary black-and-white creepfest Carnival of Souls, but - despite that impressive DNA - the film still doesn't give us enough meat to really sink our teeth into.
There's definitely a great idea buried in there somewhere, but we don't get to see enough of it to really appreciate what I think Mickey Keating was shooting for.
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