The Forest

The Forest is a 1982 American supernatural slasher film directed, written, edited and produced by Don Jones and starring Gary Kent, Tomi Barrett and John Batis. The film was shot in Sequoia National Park in California in 1981. Plot A middle-aged couple are hiking through the remote wilderness in the Sierra Nevada, when the wife becomes convinced someone is following them. Shortly after, an unseen assailant attacks the husband with a hunting knife, stabbing him to death. The killer then pursues his wife, and slits her throat. Some time later, two Los Angeles couples— Steve and Sharon, and Charlie and Teddi—plan a camping trip to escape the city. Sharon and Teddi depart before their husbands, who plan to meet them later that evening. While hiking toward their planned camping spot, Sharon and Teddi find themselves in a sudden thunderstorm, and make a camp at the base of a waterfall. Unbeknownst to them, the ghosts of two young children, John and Jennifer, watch them from a nearby cave. Sharon and Teddi are horrified when an apparition of the children's dead mother appears before them, asking where her children are, before disappearing before their eyes. This causes Teddi to panic. Meanwhile, Steve and Charlie, who have been trailing after the women, become lost as night falls. The ghosts of John and Jennifer visit their father, John Sr.—a cannibalistic hermit who lives in a cave and hunts hikers passing through the woods—and informs him that they saw two young women camping by the river. When John Sr. leaves to pursue the women, Sharon, who has fallen asleep, is awoken by the ghostly children, who warn her that their "daddy is coming." Sharon flees, leaving Teddi alone at the campsite. John arrives at the camp and stalks Teddi before killing her. Sharon manages to elude John by jumping into the river. Steve and Charlie, meanwhile, seek shelter in John's cave during a rainstorm; they are perplexed to find the cave furnished and with a fire-pit roasting a slab of meat. Moments later, they are confronted by the ghosts of John Jr. and Jennifer before their father arrives. Steve and Charlie are baffled when the children vanish, and John informs them they only "come to visit." John allows the men to stay in the cave, and offers them the meat—which, unbeknownst to them, is in fact Teddi's flesh.