Malevolence 2004

In a tense and unfolding drama, the film opens with a haunting scene from May 14, 1989: six-year-old Martin Bristol, his face scarred by the cruelty of his captor, bears witness as a brutal murder occurs in the basement of a quiet farmhouse. The story then leaps forward a decade to September 20, 1999, and follows a dangerous string of choices that pull several lives toward a fateful convergence.

Julian and his girlfriend Marylin, along with Max — Marylin’s ex-convict brother — and a third accomplice, Kurt, hatch a bank heist that promises around half a million dollars. The plan spirals when Max is shot by a security guard and dies in the backseat of the car with Julian and Marylin. Kurt escapes with a portion of the loot in a separate car, but the heist’s fallout soon proves more lethal than the robbery itself. En route to a supposed rendezvous, Kurt’s car breaks down, forcing him to grab hostages from a gas station: Samantha Harrison and her teenage daughter Courtney. They are driven to an abandoned house in the woods, and Kurt binds and gags them, leaving much of the money hidden in the van.

Courtney, resourceful and determined, manages to free herself and escapes to a nearby, unused farm. Kurt searches a vacant garage and then enters a dilapidated house inside the property, where an unseen assailant bludgeons him with a metal pulley and kills him. Back at the farm, Julian and Marylin bury Max’s body and head to the same abandoned house to meet Kurt so they can divide the money. Night falls as they arrive to find Samantha asleep on the floor, but Kurt is nowhere to be found. Julian takes his car to track Kurt down, leaving Marylin alone with Samantha.

From the foyer, Samantha witnesses a figure wearing Kurt’s sack mask descending the stairs, but Marylin’s taped mouth prevents any warning. The intruder drags Marylin into the dining room and fatally stabs her. Meanwhile, Julian’s drive along backroads draws the attention of a parked police officer, and he quietly retreats to the house, where he discovers a blood-soaked entryway and Samantha hiding in a closet. Samantha informs him that Kurt has returned and killed Marylin.

The pair decide to search for Courtney on foot and stumble onto the adjacent farm. There they find Courtney locked in an upstairs closet with Kurt’s corpse. As Samantha unties Courtney, the masked killer attacks Julian and disables Samantha and Courtney. Samantha regains consciousness in the basement, hanging from the ceiling, as the killer advances with a knife. She manages to pull down a length of metal piping, frees herself, and escapes with Courtney. The killer pursues, leaving Julian to confront the grim scene on the farm: a maze of corpses in various states of decay, and Marylin posed beside an arrangement of bones.

Samantha and Courtney manage to flee to the nearby house to grab the van keys, but the killer’s approach forces them to seek refuge in a bedroom upstairs. They hide, yet the killer locates them. Julian arrives and shoots the assailant, though he does not die immediately. In a desperate moment, Samantha shatters a chair over the killer’s head, knocking him unconscious. Julian removes the mask to reveal that the killer is Martin Bristol — now a teenager with a prominent scar across his face.

The trio escapes, and the arrival of a police officer as they leave marks a tense pause in the pursuit. Julian staggers out with a gun in hand, and the officer fatally shoots him. The officer ascends to locate Martin, only to discover that the killer has vanished.

The following morning, forensic teams uncover countless bodies on the farm while investigators retrieve journals left by the abducted boy’s captor — journals that chronicle how the boy grew into a killer under the twisted guidance he received. The journals imply that Martin, now more formidable as an adult, ended the cycle of abuse by killing his abductor in the manner he had been taught.

That evening, Samantha tucks in for the night with Courtney, only to notice a duffel bag filled with Kurt’s money resting on the floor. As the two lie down, the closet door behind them slowly opens, leaving the ending unresolved and the danger far from over. The film lingers on the idea that the malevolent influence that began years earlier may still be watching, waiting to shape the future in unseen ways.