Horror! Action! Dark comedy! Hunter Schafer and Dan Stevens star in the absurd, pleasingly unclassifiable Cuckoo. Our review:
What a year we’ve had for horror movies so far. Whether studio tentpoles like A Quiet Place Day One or indie breakouts like Longlegs, we’ve had some refreshlngly original hits. Written and directed by Tilman Singer and starring Euphoria’s Hunter Schafer, the US-German co-production Cuckoo easily initiates itself in the canon of 2024 genre bangers.
Schafer plays Gretchen, a teenager who’s forced to move to the Bavarian Alps with her dad (Marton Csokas), her stepmother (Jessica Henwick) and their daughter Alma (Mila Lieu). She’s not best pleased about it. Unsettled by hotel manager Herr König (Dan Stevens) and bored in her front-desk job, Gretchen decides to cycle home from work one night and… well, things get weird.
A quick note on this one – I saw it last week at Cineworld’s “Secret Screaming”, the chain’s horror strand of mystery screenings, and unlike all the other times I’ve gone to these events, this had absolutely no walkouts.
And if you’ve been to one of these – where punters seem primed to bail throughout the first 20 minutes if the BBFC certificate doesn’t match their prediction of, say, Alien: Romulus – that should at least tell you something about how quickly Cuckoo draws you in.
I also deliberately went in blind and I had an absolute blast with it. It’s pat to say this is one of those films you’ll enjoy more the less you know about it, but the deceptively straightforward mystery isn’t all they wrote. It’s moody and atmospheric from the outset but grows ever more unclassifiable as it hops between psychological horror and Argento-esque giallo stylings then bounds into action and dark comedy territory too.
Schafer’s performance as Gretchen is our anchor. She’s fully committed to the bit throughout, whether it’s introspective teen angst or the inevitable scream queen stuff. Without her, the film wouldn’t have its emotional core, which sneaks up and surprises you right until the very end. Plus, she keeps doing butterfly-knife tricks, which is always cool.
And then there’s Dan Stevens, who’s also been having a good year as Kong’s vet in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire and an amoral kidnapper in Abigail. He comes to this with his German fluency (see also: 2021’s I’m Your Man) and his knack for playing weirdos. Cast as a last-minute replacement for John Malkovich, Stevens has an oddball energy of his own.
Read more: Abigail review | A bloody good film – if you’ve not seen the trailer
Between them, Schafer and Stevens run the whole show, though it’s worth mentioning the supporting cast. Àstrid Bergès-Frisbey and Kalin Morrow are great as two characters who each shake the film up in different ways. As for Gretchen’s family, Csokas gives good Bad Dad and Lieu is by turns adorable and disconcerting. It’s only unfortunate that the usually brilliant Henwick is so underused.
As mentioned, there are glaring plot hints in plain sight, but Singer’s film is compelling all the way through. Whether you’re racing ahead of its reveals or totally in the dark, it’s constantly entertaining and well-paced at 103 minutes. Better yet, it’s pleasingly un-self-conscious about plotting or exposition.
Setting horror fans abuzz since it premiered in Berlin earlier this year, Cuckoo arrives not with the mandatory spoiler moratorium of a horror film built on cheap shocks and twists, but with an infectious sense of fun about itself and its bonkers thrills, chills, and spills. You’ll gasp. You’ll laugh. And you’ll never want to wear headphones while cycling again.
Cuckoo arrives in UK and Irish cinemas from Friday 23rd August.
