A passionate affair begins between two friends who shared a traumatic event in The Burning Season. Alena (Sara Canning) and her husband Tom (Joe Pingue) arrive at the Luna Lake Resort for the wedding of their longtime friends JB (Jonas Chernick) and Poppy (Tanisha Thammavongsa). However, disaster strikes during the reception when JB, high on cocaine, lets it slip that he and Alena have been having an affair. The story then moves backwards as the affair develops over yearly trips to the resort and ties to a traumatic event nearly three decades before.
The Burning Season Synopsis
The Burning Season is a romantic drama directed by Sean Garrity (The End of Sex) and co-written by and starring Jonas Chernick (Ashgrove, James vs. His Future Self). The film begins with the Young Alena (Natalie Jane) and the man then known as Benny (Christian Meer) standing in front of a burning cabin and promising each other to keep whatever happened a secret. The rest of the story is then told in seven reverse-chronological chapters. Alena and JB are reunited and turn their shared trauma into a passionate multi-year affair, despite their separate relationships.
My Thoughts on The Burning Season
On the surface, a film that seemingly begins with the simultaneous end of two marriages and moves the plot backwards shouldn't work. However, The Burning Season works by subtly revealing more about the history between Alena and JB and how their shared trauma blossoms into love. The Burning Season has hooked you into this unconventional love story by the time the film reaches its final act prologue to reveal exactly what happened between the two.
