Filmmaker Lovinder Gill’s Seclusion tells the story of a young woman, Mary (Lyndsey Bentham), who lives in her car at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. After her car is broken into and all her possessions are stolen, Mary finds an AirBnB rental listing for a mansion just outside town and decides to check it out to see if it’s empty.
Her first step is to turn off the security system alarm, following an elaborate set of instructions. Once in, Mary starts exploring the mansion, finding a pool table, a wine cellar, and a child’s bedroom with the name “Maggie” on it. She helps herself to snacks in the kitchen, a bottle of wine, and a long, luxurious bath.
Careful not to break anything or leave a small footprint, Mary falls asleep in the master bedroom, only to dream that someone is in the house with her. She wakes to find the picture of the family matriarch reset, even though she swore she’d put it face down. Then, out of nowhere, she runs into the mansion’s owner, Howard (Jamie Craib)… this is not going to be good.
Seclusion is an interesting horror… more of a thriller. First, we’re dropped in the middle of COVID-19—a much deadlier version. The story plays on a lot of fears we had at the beginning of the pandemic, where germaphobia was running rampant, and we couldn’t trust one another, especially strangers.
Mary (Lyndsey Bentham) tries to keep it together in Seclusion (2025).
“Mary finds an AirBnB rental listing for a mansion just outside of town and decides to check out the mansion to see if it’s empty.”
Then there’s the mystery box. For Mary, this is no ordinary house, and because she hasn’t slept, she is having strange dreams. Are these omens, or is she falling victim to an empty stomach? As she wanders the house, she finds clues about the current owners, but they’re nowhere to be found, and what’s behind the locked doors?
Lastly, who is Howard, and why is he in a hazmat suit, obsessively cleaning? Despite his constant warnings to leave, Mary can’t because her car/home won’t start, and there’s really nowhere to go during a pandemic.
While Seclusion has all the earmarks of a horror film, director Gill tells a more thoughtful story of human interaction in Roz Mihalko and Andy Silverman’s script, especially during the pandemic. It has more heart than scares. Lyndsey Bentham gives a complex, emotional performance and is essentially the story’s throughline, appearing in 100% of the film. As Howard, Jamie Craib is the mystery he needs to be.
No spoilers, but the ending is more than your typical horror and moves into a psychological, otherworldly realm… I know I’m being vague. Gill wants to say something about the human condition rather than give you a bloody, gory mess in the end.
In the end, writer/director Lovinder Gill’s Seclusion isn’t chasing cheap jump scares so much as it’s building tension out of mistrust, isolation, and the fear that help might be worse than danger. The film circles the same question: what happens to your humanity when fear becomes your everyday life?
For more information, visit the Seclusion official website.
"…interesting horror... more of a thriller."
