This seems to be an attempt to create intellectual horror, or intellectual dread. There are atmospheric moments, but since the mishmash of story and backstory are ultimately incomprehensible, not in an artistic and interesting way but in the manner of incoherence, the movie is much ado about nothing. If you want an interesting and strangely suspenseful movie which moves along at a similarly deliberate pace, try Phase 4, and excellent understated science-fiction drama/eco-horror. They Remain seems to be trying to achieve something similar, but fails in ho-hum fashion.

"They Remain" is that type of movie without any character or situation development. The viewer sees two researchers seeking out something, somewhere in an undefined period of time and that is the mystery of the story: lack of information. Along the boring screenplay, nothing happens along 1:42 h in extremely slow pace. The Afro-American and the Caucasian have no chemistry, but they will certainly shag with each other in the last half part. And there is no explanation for the awful conclusion. Advice when most needed is least heeded but do not believe in the fake reviews and do not spend your time watching this crap. My vote is one (awful).

Title (Brazil): Not Available

They Remain is a move about two scientists, Keith (William Jackson Harper) and Jessica (Rebecca Henderson) who are left alone in a makeshift cabin to research a weird animal behavior in an area that used to be a cult compound. As Jessica does sciency stuff and Keith walks around, things get weirder, Jessica starts hearing things, Keith gets more paranoid. This goes into overdrive when they find a horn that seems to be an artifact of the cult members. Then they go super crazy, try to kill each other, but in the end, go into a cave to apparently join those cult members who remain -- hence the movie title.

The movie goes nowhere for the first 30 minutes, then continues to go nowhere. Weird stuff happens, the two get sexual, then try to kill each other. All of this seemingly is either due to the magic horn the uncovered, which was a centerpiece for the supposedly extinct cult, or was an effect of their location, or maybe both. But it's basically weird stuff until some semblance of a point provided at the end, where Jessica asks if Keith is there to save her or join the cult.

Other comments pointed to how this is similar to Picnic at Hanging Rock. I appreciate that comment as it makes me realize the type of movie this is and that it's not supposed to make sense. Yes, there's some magic object that causes them to go crazy, (apparently) but the how or why is a mystery.

Picnic at Hanging Rock worked for me because it starts out bucolic and almost lazy, then turns dreamy and mysterious, then goes back to reality. It's bookended with normalcy and that touch of mystery makes it fun to try to piece together what happened, then finally accept you just don't know.

Why They Remain didn't work for me is that it's just a bunch of weird stuff linked to the magic horn. Why'd Keith stare at ants? Magic horn. What's with the dreams? Magic horn. Why'd she poison him? Magic horn. Why'd she go out? Magic horn. There are no rules, no clues, just weird stuff because of magic horn. So you're left wondering what the heck is going on until pretty much the end. And, in the end, it just didn't warrant the 90 previous minutes.

4/10. I can see how some can just sit and just be absorbed in the weirdness and deliberate slowness of the movie. It's a movie where I think you either love it or hate it, so I can see alot of 1-3 or 8-10 ratings, but I can't see alot of people saying, "yeah, it's okay. I'll give it a 6". Not saying you can't, only that, more than other movies, I think this will get more love/hate then "it's okay" or "pretty good".