Quartile rating: 5.5/10 · 1 rating
John James is a writer; his wife has left him. He moves with his two middle-school children to an isolated house off a dirt road in South Carolina. The property has an Indian burial mound, which fascinates his daughter, Louisa, who's entering puberty.
The New Daughter has an intriguing premise blending puberty metaphor with ancient burial mound horror, but the execution is uneven. Kevin Costner delivers a grounded performance and the rural South Carolina setting is competently shot with decent atmosphere, but the film ultimately squanders its more interesting thematic threads. The plot devolves into fairly generic creature-horror territory, and the ending feels abrupt and unsatisfying rather than boldly bleak. The concept of linking a girl's coming-of-age with supernatural transformation has potential novelty, but the film handles it too conventionally to stand out in the crowded horror genre.