Cuckoo

Euphoria’s Hunter Schafer goes head-to-head with Downton Abbey alum Dan Stevens in this frightfully weird horror.

Pining for her mother in a throng of bass-strumming and queer angst, teenager Gretchen (Schafer) wishes her mute stepsister Alma (Mila Lieu, Dodger) would just get lost. But when her estranged dad (Marton Csokas, Head South, MIFF 2024) and his new wife (Jessica Henwick, Glass Onion) accept creepy Mr König’s (Stevens) job offer to overhaul the architecture of a suspiciously Overlook-like hotel in the Bavarian Alps, Gretchen quickly regrets her sniping. There’s something stalking the woods in a pale mackintosh, hotel guests can’t keep their dinner down and a perverse experiment is proceeding unchecked – with dire consequences.

The eye-popping second feature from German writer/director Tilman Singer, who delivered the demonic possession film Luz, set Berlinale audiences aflutter thanks to its wild and wacky, stylish yet sinister spin on the genre. Proving that Schafer has lead-actor chops with her deft rendition of the Final Girl and that there’s no scenery the magnetically unhinged Stevens won’t gleefully chew, Cuckoo will have you flying off the wall.

“Refreshingly unconventional and unpredictable in every way, right down to its raucous, entertainingly silly finale.” – Bloody Disgusting