Outpost is one edgy film. With a minimal cast and scant set changes, we have no option but to zero in on the world of this lady whose reason for being in such a remote, potentially dangerous situation is the unresolved threat of a man at whose hands she’s suffered years of violence. Knowing that, along with the flashbacks which contrast so strongly with her apparent strength and capability, keep the viewer under the creeping feeling that something’s not quite right; a feeling which doesn’t let up from start to finish.

Kate (Beth Dover) has just suffered a brutal, traumatic attack at the hands of her abusive ex, Mike (Tim Neff). Displaying the early signs of PTSD and with Mike still out there, she rejects suggestions of group therapy and asks her best friend Nickie (Ta’Rea Campbell) to put in a recommendation to her brother Earl (Ato Essandoh) for help. This turns out to be as a volunteer mountain forest fire lookout in northern Idaho, where she hopes the solitude of the outpost, a structure built to allow her to see the isolated landscape for miles around, will help heal her trauma and keep her mind occupied. She’s done the required training, seems to know it by rote, and is physically capable. But even early on in the movie we see glimpses of just how deeply her trauma has hit. Terrifying flashbacks begin to hit with a suddenness and ferocity that’s completely unexpected and viscerally shocking before she’s even got as far as the outpost; but once she gets there and settles in as best she can in its simple surroundings it seems she has a handle on things. Or does she?

Her nearest neighbour is Reggie (Dylan Baker); an eccentric widower who’s tough to read and unreceptive to unsolicited visits, but also shows tolerance and kindness to her, whilst making it quite clear he likes to be alone. She appears in control and almost at peace when footsteps hammer up the many steps to her lofty eyrie. A bad dream, she eventually decides. But then other insidious events intrude; dead animals crawling with maggots bring their own horrors from her earlier past, and there’s repeated focus on intrusive insects, one corner of the roof being infested with flies in particular.  She’s trained to spot smoke, and on one hand deals with a potential disaster well, but imagines others.

Overall she seems to be a tough, capable lady mainly coping with a terrible experience, but encounters with random hikers unsettle her, offering their own potential for threat, until she meets Bertha (Becky Ann Baker), a charming middle-aged lady who seems to know the mountain well and with whom she feels a connection. She’s been a victim of domestic abuse also, and the two begin spending much time together, during which Bertha, with her laid-back and expansive air, teaches Kate how to shoot to protect herself as well as find food should it be necessary, and this leads to Kate seeming to begin to heal and become a true woman of the mountains. But is this the case, or is something darker and more insidious at work?

Alongside the quiet beauty of the setting, the imagery of death and decay emphasises this. Outpost is a quiet film, the music giving nothing away; in fact largely it’s all about the viewer being in the same mindset as Kate, and drawing their own conclusions; until they’re drawn for you.