Made-in-Alaska pictures are rare enough, and director Justin Edwards here collaborates on a script with his real-life brother Michael on a further specialty item. This sibling comedy concerns LARPs—live-action role-playing games—with participants willingly running through a maze of arranged clues and problem-solving exercises all coordinated by a Games Master and a number of co-conspirators hiding in the foliage. Despite promotional material suggesting otherwise, nothing truly paranormal happens.
Paul (Justin) and Gary (Henry Kaiser), somewhat estranged brothers, reunite in an Alaskan lodge some 30 miles from anywhere, as a birthday gift to their youngest brother Bill (Adam McCabe, who may remind viewers of Giovanni Ribisi). Returning to the LARP larks in which they bonded in youth, the trio takes on the personas of "detectives," journeying into the wild and investigating the disappearance of reclusive scholar Adrian Belmont, who went to the woods to study child-stealing Inuit boogeymen ("Qalupaliks") and their magic.
Squabbles and old grudges threaten to tear the brothers apart again, but the mystery-solving lure of cracking logic puzzles and surmounting absurd limitations imposed on each player by the Games Master keeps the trio together. In the end, all that's missing is the proverbial laugh, group hug, and Mr. Brady saying "Well, we all learned a very valuable lesson together." The script is actually witty and earnest, deploying only a few swear words (and beer-drinking) that might have put this material into PG-13 territory with the MPAA.
But ultimately, this mainly appeals to a gamer/costumed-re-enactor/cosplay demographic, and a small segment of them at that. If you have patrons interested in such games, consider including this title on your public library shelves. One might note no females on view whatsoever, though as a distant genre relation the glitzy, big-budget YA Emma Roberts suspenser Nerve (2016) might be considered somewhat LARPy, and newcomer Tom Hanks paired with Susan Strasberg for the TV movie Mazes and Monsters (1982) done nearer the inception of the craze. The indoctrinated will tell you Detective Detective Detective is a purer glimpse into the pastime. Optional, with a special interest for Alaska-centric entertainment shelves.