Film Review – CUCKOO: Hunter Schafer is Solid in Tilman Singer’s Bizarre and Freaky Horror Film [Fantasia 2024]
Cuckoo Review
Cuckoo (2024) Film Review from the 28th Annual Fantasia International Film Festival, a movie written and directed by Tilman Singer and starring Hunter Schafer, Jan Bluthardt, Marton Csokas, Jessica Henwick, Dan Stevens, Mila Lieu, Greta Fernandez, Astrid Berges-Frisbey, Kalin Morrow and Konrad Singer.
Filmmaker Tilman Singer’s new film, Cuckoo, starts off weird and gets progressively more bizarre as it moves along. There’s one great scene and a lot of meandering sequences during the movie’s duration. The best scene has a teenager named Gretchen (Hunter Schafer) being buried by huge bookcases which are dropped down purposefully by a key demonic character to try to stop Gretchen. Or something like that. Cuckoo is a stylish movie. If The Shining met The Grudge, this may be the type of movie you would get if those films had a wicked love child. While Schafer turns in some interesting work as a performer, the movie gets lost in its own lofty ambitions. Ultimately, it’s just too offbeat for its own good.
As the film opens, Gretchen and her family come to a resort in the German Alps. The slimy owner of the place is portrayed convincingly by Dan Stevens. Gretchen eventually becomes so bored that she gets a job at one point at the resort as a clerk. Her dad (Marton Csokas) and her young stepmom (Jessica Henwick) are right alongside Gretchen as is Gretchen’s younger stepsister, Alma (Mila Lieu). This film is chock full of creepy noises and loud sounds that offset the tranquility that doesn’t really exist too comfortably among the family in their new habitat. Gretchen reacts to the disturbing things around her in negative ways while little Alma has seizures in the interim.
The plot is solidified by an older woman who makes peculiar sounds that seem like they’ve come directly off the sound reels of The Grudge horror pictures. She’s only scary in spurts as the movie tries to do too much and too little, simultaneously. Gretchen is warned not to be out in the late evening as things are surely too dangerous around this newfound home away from home.
Cuckoo has a bit of fun being weird. Schafer plays the role of Gretchen well although the character is not particularly easy to relate to. The filmmakers seem more concerned with creating the atmosphere surrounding this film’s characters rather than focusing on in-depth characterizations. Dan Stevens shines in his role, though, as the resident weird person behind the scenes of the wild occurrences that take place throughout the movie. This film feels like it doesn’t want viewers to get definitive answers as to what, exactly, is going on through the picture. While a lot happens, most of the movie’s suspense comes in the very last scenes of the picture which help set the stage for a potential sequel. There will most likely never be one, though.
This film has surprises but they aren’t telegraphed particularly well. Instead, the picture goes back and forth and leaves audiences wondering why things happen as they do. There are more questions raised than answered here and the movie is all the less satisfying as a result. Then, there’s the matter of the picture’s pacing as it goes back and forth uneasily between a horror movie and a science fiction tale of experiments gone awry.
Cuckoo tricks audiences into thinking there’s some substance underneath all this film’s stylish scenes. The best scene with the bookcases falling against one another as Gretchen fights for her survival is really well orchestrated. Many of the other scenes are not done as well and the staging of the “dropping” bookcases moments are symbolic of what this film could have been if it wanted to be. It’s too inconclusive to compare this film to The Shining which offered more dread than this movie ultimately does. This new film wants to have its cake and eat it too and the ending seems tacked on right at the last minute, for whatever reason.
Tossed into the mix is a good performance by Stevens that ultimately gets lost in the shuffle. There are experiments that are being conducted that would never be discovered by Gretchen under normal circumstances. This film cheats more than it plays fairly. Schafer emerges unscathed, though, with a performance that gets a “B+” for effort but, ultimately, the filmmakers don’t allow the plot to develop organically. Scenes seemed forced and certain characters’ actions ring false, even for a movie like this, especially those actions of Gretchen
There’s also a detective, Henry (Jan Bluthardt), whose role goes nowhere despite some interesting possibilities which are never quite developed upon effectively. Cuckoo has some scares in the last half hour but this may be an example of too little, too late. Another central character is Gretchen’s would-be friend (Astrid Berges-Frisbey) who comes off as Gretchen’s potential companion. We learn of dangerous experiments that characters are conducting but it’s hard to figure out where Gretchen fits into this movie as a purposeful character. By introducing a lot of complex themes, the movie eventually falters by settling into a routine genre film at the end and that’s a bit disappointing to report.
Other casting choices are suspect such as the decision to bring Jessica Henwick into the mix as the stepmom. Henwick seems like she came from another movie altogether and the picture could have developed this character who is pivotal to the action just a bit more. That being said, this is really Schafer’s movie and the star is up to the task of keeping the audience interested even if nothing too scary ever happens. Unless, of course, you’ve never seen The Shining or The Grudge. Those gimmicks employed in those movies are not all used effectively here which means the movie’s inspirations were hard to surpass for the filmmakers.
Cuckoo is a twist-filled horror movie. It’s more or less a nightmare that has come to life. Even in a nightmare, though, there’s some wiggle room to try to figure out what the dream is doing wrong. But that’s another story. Cuckoo. Yeah this movie’s title lives up to the finished product That’s for certain. It’s an appropriate title for this bizarre picture.
Rating: 5.5/10
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