This Christmas, the Thomas family have an unexpected extra guest: daughter Sarah's (Caroline Tudor) filmmaker boyfriend Ryan (UNREAL's Brad Schmidt) who uses the family gathering to pop the question. Mother Natalie (CHRONIC's Laura Niemi) puts on a happy face, but father Greg (THE RETURN's Peter O'Brien) is not the only one who seems less than enthused about the new couple: there's also her childhood friend Tyler (DEXTER's Brando Eaton) - who sings a love song to her at a public venue - and his mother Jane (THE EXORCIST's Eileen Dietz), as well as creepy caretaker Carl (Patrick Burch), while Sheriff Hank (LOST HIGHWAY's Michael Shamus Wiles) and Deputy Reed (Craig Rees) are cold and unfriendly to everyone since the recent disappearance of a young woman feared dead. Anyone of them could be watching the isolated cabin; and at least one most certainly is, and Ryan's and Sarah's first vacation with the family could be their last. Slickly shot, atmospheric, and well-acted, LAKE ALICE starts out quite well with some understated tension within the family and between the family and the locals ("People remember you for who you were rather than are now," says Greg), and there is some unease as the film lets on that the killer of the pre-credits victim or someone else has set their sights on the family. Unfortunately, the film seems to just switch onto autopilot at the third act (the film is just under eighty minute so the viewer is not waiting that long for something to happen) with dead phones, missing car keys, power outages, and a THE STRANGERS-esque masked killer murdering his way through several of the red herrings who inexplicably stop by the cabin in the middle of the night simply to narrow down the list of suspects for the viewer. While the viewer can be forgiven for expecting a cynical and stupid post-SCREAM twist involving the boyfriend's filmmaker character, the actual twist is more mundane. The US-lensed feature debut of British-born Australian actor Ben Milliken (NEWCASTLE), LAKE ALICE (also known in the UK as LAKE TOMAHAWK) is proficient in its execution but offers nothing particularly novel, making one wonder whether the director just chose to make his debut in the genre because it was more marketable than a more personal project.