'Lovely Molly'

• SXSW Film

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• God Gave Rock & Roll to Her

  BY JOSH ROSENBLATT

• A Silent Pearl Pops With New Sound

  BY MARJORIE BAUMGARTEN

• The Path to Enlightenment

  BY MARJORIE BAUMGARTEN

• 'Eden'

  BY MONICA RIESE

• 'Sun Don't Shine'

  BY MARC SAVLOV

• 'John Dies at the End'

  BY JOE O'CONNELL

• 'Decoding Deepak'

  BY ANNE S. LEWIS

• '$ellebrity'

  BY ANNE S. LEWIS

• 'Code of the West'

  BY JORDAN SMITH

• 'Gimme the Loot'

  BY MONICA RIESE

• 'Starlet'

  BY NORA ANKRUM

• 'In Our Nature'

  BY MELANIE HAUPT

• 'The Imposter'

  BY MELANIE HAUPT

• 'Francine'

  BY MARJORIE BAUMGARTEN

• 'Citadel'

  BY RICHARD WHITTAKER

• 'Blue Like Jazz'

  BY JOE O'CONNELL

• 'Jeff'

  BY ANNE S. LEWIS

• 'Lovely Molly'

  BY RICHARD WHITTAKER

• 'Booster'

  BY ASHLEY MORENO

Lovely Molly

The Blair Witch Project shadows Eduardo Sanchez's career, but with a little distance, it now seems like the first step that lead to this blue-collar creeper. Newlywed Molly (Lodge) is in trouble: The film opens with her holding a butcher knife to her own neck, telling a video camera, "It's not my fault." It's clear that she's a victim of something, but Sanchez skillfully obscures whether family secrets or eldritch forces are to blame. As with Amy Smart in Sanchez's underrated 2008 Chinese ghost story Seventh Moon, the movie thrives on Lodge's strange, textured, and brittle performance. It's also right to talk about Blair Witch here as Sanchez has evolved its strongest parts: His sparing use of Molly's POV footage is as much a nod to his breakthrough creep show as the rattling soundtrack provided by Chicago post-rock giants Tortoise. Yet its real inheritance is a sense of powerlessness before the supernatural.

Thursday, March 15, 4:45pm, Alamo Lamar