As a horror movie critic, I’m pretty plugged into the horror world. I know about most of the new genre releases, whether they’re big theatrical films or smaller VOD movies, so it’s always nice to be pleasantly surprised by a title that completely slipped through the cracks for me. It’s one of my favorite things about being a critic, and when I was offered a screener for Winter Island, I thought this film had the potential to be one of those fun surprises. The premise seemed intriguing and the trailer looked pretty creepy, so I took a leap of faith and decided to check it out.

Winter Island was directed by Tony Doupé, and it stars Elijah Carnazzo, Jason Adkins, Ashlyn Harlos, and Katie Prentiss. The movie begins with a young girl named Abby sneaking out of her house and hanging herself, and when her family realizes that she’s missing, they’re absolutely devastated. They don’t know what’s happened to her, but they try their best to hold out hope that she’s still alive.

However, Abby’s older brother, Galen, soon comes across some eerie, potentially supernatural phenomena, so he begins to suspect the worst. As you might be able to guess, the police eventually find the girl’s body, but that doesn’t put the paranormal disturbances to rest. Instead, these apparitions eventually become even more intense, and they lead Galen to discover a dark secret hiding in his family tree.

I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a great premise for a horror film, and for the first half hour or so of Winter Island, I was totally on board. For starters, this section of the movie is dripping with atmosphere, so even when there’s nothing particularly spooky going on, you just know that something terrible awaits.

Then, when Abby’s ghost makes itself known to her brother, the film gets even better. These moments build on the atmosphere and employ very simple but nevertheless exquisitely creepy imagery, so if you’re a fan of ghosts, I think you’re going to love these spectral scenes.

Last but not least, this part of Winter Island also features a really intriguing mystery surrounding Abby’s fate. We know the girl hanged herself, but there are a few things about this case that don’t entirely add up. What’s more, the fact she’s back as a ghost implies that there’s more to the story than we know, and all those uncertainties will have you on the edge of your seat as you wonder just what the hell is really going on here.

But around the 30-minute mark, the film starts to drag a little. The supernatural element takes a back seat to some much less interesting family drama, and I found myself slowly checking out. To be fair, these quarrels would be fine as a narrative side dish, but as the main course, they’re just not compelling enough to carry the story on their own.

It was a real bummer, and I thought this slow middle section would prove fatal for Winter Island. But thankfully, I was wrong. The ghostly goings-on take center stage once again in the last half hour or so, and they balance out the family drama quite nicely. In fact, the third act is the best part of this entire movie.

The imagery gets a bit more elaborate without diminishing in quality, and the plot starts to go down a time-honored route. Taking its cue from ghostly classics like The Uninvited and The Changeling, this is where Abby’s ghost leads Galen to discover the evil lurking in their family’s past, and it does those films proud. Granted, Winter Island allows us to figure out its secret well before the main characters do, but even though we already know where it’s all headed, seeing Galen and company discover it for themselves is still a great ride.

What’s more, this third act also imbues the movie with an unmistakable message. See, Galen’s father is a devout Christian, but he’s a very particular kind of Christian. He’s a fundamentalist who apparently believes that just about anything secular is evil, and he seems to think that church groups are the answer to all the world’s problems.

For instance, we eventually learn that Abby turned to him for help when she went through a particularly painful experience, but he sorely let her down. Instead of giving her the loving comfort and affirmation she needed, he just brought her to one of his church groups, and predictably, that merely exacerbated the problem.

Simply put, this guy is not a very good father, and as a Christian myself, I would also say he’s a bad Christian. He warps his faith in such a way that it’s paradoxically too narrow as well as too wide, and as expected, those misguided beliefs quickly lead him down a dark path. He eventually becomes the antithesis of what a Christian should be, and his fate makes for a hard-hitting cautionary tale about the dangers of a malformed faith.

That being said, there was one thing about the message of Winter Island that didn’t sit well with me. The story centers around a particular (and particularly twisted) form of Christianity, but if you pay close attention, the film seems to equate it with the entirety of the Christian faith. Most notably, one of the key characters appears to take issue with Galen’s father simply because he’s a Christian, and the movie never really acknowledges that there might be more to the faith than just this warped take on it.

To be fair, I don’t know if the filmmakers intended their message to go that far, but either way, it just comes across as borderline anti-Christian. We’re not all ignorant fundamentalists, and if that sentiment really is intentional, it’s misinformed at best and ignorant at worst.

However, as problematic as that may be, it’s not quite enough to derail the entire experience. The good still outweighs the bad here, so I’m happy to report that Winter Island was in fact the pleasant surprise I hoped it would be. It’s a classic ghost story in the tradition of some of the best titles the subgenre has to offer, so if you’re a fan of these movies, I recommend checking this one out when you get the chance.