There is a darkness to almost all horror. It is trying to scare you after all. But most horror also contains at least a sliver of light. Someone survives in the end. Evil is vanquished (at least until the sequel). But there is a certain type of horror movie that revels in the darkness, that becomes completely, and utterly bleak.

Eden Lake is one such film.

Steve (Michael Fassbender) learns that developers have bought up an old swimming hole of his, soon to be turned into a posh neighborhood. He decides to take his girlfriend Jenny (Kelly Reilly) there for the weekend.

Almost immediately they are accosted by rude, working-class teens. Though there is an entire lake to enjoy, the teens plop themselves down next to the couple, blast their obnoxious music loudly, allow their vicious dog to roam freely, and generally make asses of themselves.

Ever the hero Steve walks up to the gang, turns their radio down, and asks them to keep their dog away. But then he immediately backs down once the teens push back. This will be a recurring theme. Steve periodically puffs out his chest and roars at the kids and then whimpers back with apologies when they don’t scurry away.

In the morning they’ll find their food covered with ants. During a swim they’ll return to find their bag stolen and along with it the keys to their car. Things escalate from there and turn very dark, violent, and bad.

For the first half of the film, Jenny seems ever a pacifist. She mostly lets Steve do whatever he wants, while also urging him to just leave the kids alone. But once Steve becomes captured she becomes the more stereotypical Final Girl. But it becomes increasingly clear this film wants nothing but to make her suffer. It revels in her humiliation. Once she opens a dumpster lid and finds it completely filled with nasty, liquidy goo. Naturally, she jumps it anyway. There is no reason she couldn’t have just run at that point, but the film really wants her filthy.

All of the characters make terrible decisions all the time. Our heroes have several opportunities to just leave. The kids are obviously up to no good, and this lake, while pretty, isn’t some amazing natural wonder. Yet they stay. The kids escalate things to a ridiculous degree for no good reason.

Even though this lake used to be some kind of recreational area, complete with maps and signage, there is no car park and no discernable trails of any kind. The developers have put up a massive fence around it but apparently done no other work at all.

There is no indication that the lake (which is actually a disused quarry) is all that big, and yet the kids hunt Steve and Jenny for a good day and a half with them never finding their way to a road or a way out.

Etc., and so forth. I’m used to horror movies that make no sense and whose characters make stupid decisions, but this is beyond the pale. It is also mean-spirited. It is relentlessly savage.

Maybe I’m getting soft in my old age but I couldn’t stomach it.