Triangle (2009)

This film is possibly the most difficult one I have ever attempted to review, because its plot twists are so tightly tied to its core themes. It works both as a mind-bending procedural puzzle and as a dark, psychological myth about guilt, grief and punishment.

We start with a group of friends heading out on a small yacht for a day cruise. The group comprises Jess, Greg, Victor, Sally, Downey and a new friend, Heather. Jess is acting a little out of character but says she's just tired - and indeed, once they get underway, she heads into the cabin to snooze for a couple of hours. She wakes, startled, after a bad dream (which we see), but can't quite remember what it was about.

The day continues for a time as they reach deeper waters. Before long, a really weird situation unfolds: the wind completely drops and as they look to the horizon, a wicked storm approaches. They do what they can at short notice, but the storm is violent and chaos reigns. The boat is capsized, leaving the survivors clinging to the upturned hull - and Heather is nowhere to be found.

Just as they are sitting wondering what to do next, they spot a huge ocean liner heading their way called the Aeolus. They wave furiously, and it pulls alongside close enough for them to hop onto the boarding platform and head up the steps. But when they get inside, the ship appears completely empty. Not a living soul in sight.

From here on in, the film plays out like a Greek tragedy - evoking Sisyphus and Aeolus - turning into a thriller about a person trapped in a task they cannot escape, desperately trying to push a 'boulder' up a hill while hoping for a different outcome. You'll likely know about time-loop films if you're reading this (Groundhog Day, Happy Death Day, Edge of Tomorrow), but it's important to note that this is certainly not a simple 'wake up, die, repeat' setup. The film's gripping thrills lie in how its timelines overlap and collide. Characters encounter different versions of themselves and others simultaneously, making for a truly brain-bending experience!

The ship itself is eerie and feels like a haunted vessel, abandoned and decaying, which makes for a great atmosphere from start to finish. To add to this, Christian Henson’s haunting score (featuring the track 'Lullaby') brings a constant sense of inescapable dread, giving the whole film a feverish, nightmare-like quality.

Melissa George’s performance as Jess is brilliant throughout, depicting raw parental anxiety, exhaustion and deep-seated regret. Underneath the slasher/sci-fi surface lies a deeply tragic story about how far a mother will go to fix her mistakes. The rest of the cast do exceptionally well, too. Thankfully, the director doesn't waste time on excessive setup; we pretty much only see what we need to in order to try to unpick the puzzle and enjoy the mystery.

It has been hard to write this without spoiling the experience, but hopefully I haven't given too much away! It's rightfully renowned as one of the most underrated, clever psychological thrillers of the 2000s. I'd encourage you to go in as blind as possible and pay close attention to every minute of the build-up and the actions of the characters, especially in the first half. And then watch it again to enjoy spotting all the clues you missed the first time around! I did find a 17-minute YouTube video by Thomas Thorogood in which offered a deep analysis of what was going on, if you fancy having a look at that (or can't work it out)!

I did also see plenty of 'triangles' weaved into the visuals, which was a nice nod, and Room 237 with writing on mirrors? Surely The Shining's in there too! A super film, well worth tracking down. It's streaming all over the place now and certainly doesn't feel in any way dated, despite being made over 15 years ago. Highly recommended.

Pressure (2026) - A Guest Review by Chad Dixon

This is a dramatisation, with some historical tweaks, about the most important decision taken that ultimately became the turning point of WWII.

James Stagg (Andrew Scott), is a highly esteemed Met Office expert, recommended by Churchill himself, to become the Head of the Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Force Meteorological Committee. Leaving his heavily pregnant wife after a simple breakfast in their leafy suburban house, he is driven directly to SHAEF which is housed in what looks like a requisitioned stately home.

Arriving in his RAF Group Captain uniform, he's shown directly to the nerve centre of the forecasting team where amongst the 20 or so forecasters are dozens of historical weather charts for the same early June days throughout the previous forty years fill the walls. A cheery atmosphere is led by American meteorologist, USAAF Colonel Irving P. Krick (Chris Messina), who is holding court with jovial anecdotes of all the times he had forecast weather correctly for other WWII campaigns and Hollywood movie shoots in places that Stagg immediately realises are nowhere as volatile and dynamic as the North Atlantic.

Stagg then immediately mobilises the team to get on their phones and collate the latest meteorological data from as many relevant international weather stations as possible to obtain the best accurate up to date forecast. It's just four days before the proposed D-Day date and the first crucial weather report is due. Later, when it's time to present that crucial report to Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower (Brendan Fraser), at the combined Chiefs of Staff meeting, Stagg pulls rank over Krick and because of their absolute disagreement on how to best forecast for the Normandy Landings, denies his request to attend the meeting too.

Stagg's initial report is that there is a good chance that major storms are on the way to the English Channel and the proposed day of invasion is totally out of the question. It doesn't help that the current weather is fine and clear. Obviously the joint chiefs of staff that include a very belligerent and condescending Field Marshal Montgomery (Damian Lewis) are all furious as they state that all the initial preparations are complete and all their various forces are ready to go.

Because of Krick's prior amicable and successful forecasting relationship with Eisenhower, Stagg initially feels isolated that his approach is not being listened to and when bad news comes on the phone about the bombing of a maternity hospital his wife was admitted to, right in the middle of an Eisenhower rant regarding the inconvenient report, he does not let on regarding his personal worry and defiantly stands his ground. Lieutenant Kay Summersby (Kerry Condon), the General's personal assistant is the only one who is empathic to the impossible stress James must be under and so becomes Stagg's ally.

This is a brilliantly told drama with, at it's core, a commanding and Oscar-worthy performance from Scott. All the supporting actors do very well too and Lewis is especially menacing as the overbearing Field Marshall.

The expansive detail of the Supreme Headquarters is a brilliantly recreated intense environment that gives the viewer a real insight into how the Allied War Machine must have been organised and what incredible responsibility certain individuals had. Also well-inserted archive footage of Allied troop organisations on the English South coast spliced in with newly shot scenes really did enhance the understanding of just what an incredible offensive preparation it all must have been. Of course, we all know the eventual outcome of Operation Overlord but seeing this important piece of history that led up to that decision of when to go, really puts in clear perspective the ultimate command Nature has on us mere mortals.

Coherence (2013)

This is a very confusing film! An extremely low-budget sci-fi outing for sure. Apparently, director James Ward Byrkit shot it over five nights in his own living room on a budget of around $50,000. Not only that, but the actors were not given any kind of standard script. Instead, Byrkit gave each of them a set of individual character index cards every day, outlining their character's backstory, personal motivators and secret goals (hidden from the others) for that night's scenes - without telling them what the other actors were going to do! So they had no idea what twists were coming, resulting in genuine surprises and shocks! Fascinating! It's a complex plot relating to a quantum mechanics thought experiment involving the now-famous Schrödinger's Cat, turning it into a claustrophobic, paranoid thriller.

We begin with eight friends gathering for a dinner party at a house in Northern California: Em, her boyfriend Kevin, host couple Mike and Lee, along with Hugh, Beth, Amir and Laurie (Kevin’s ex-girlfriend, whose presence creates immediate tension). They're all quite annoying twenty-somethings, clearly middle-class privileged - you know the type: little fingers raised while drinking wine, dinner parties, expensive clothes and cars. The last people I'd want to hang out with!

Anyway, on this particular night, Miller's Comet is passing extremely close to Earth and strange things begin to happen almost immediately. Em’s mobile phone screen shatters for no reason and mobile reception dies. Hugh mentions that his brother - a physicist - warned him that odd things might happen during the comet’s flyby, citing a historical incident in Finland in 1923 where a comet caused a village to become completely disoriented, leading one woman to call the police claiming the man in her house was not her husband.

Suddenly, a power outage plunges the entire neighbourhood into darkness. Looking outside, the group notices the entire street is blacked out except for one single house a couple of blocks away. Hugh and Amir walk over to the other house to ask if they can use a landline. When they return, Hugh has a bleeding cut on his forehead and is carrying a box. Inside the box, they find a table-tennis bat and photographs of all eight dinner guests - including one of Hugh that appears to have been taken that very night while they were inside!

It soon becomes clear what is happening. At least, if you're a physicist! The pitch-black area in the middle of the street acts as a decoherence boundary (a split zone), apparently. The comet’s passage has collapsed quantum superposition into a real-world reality overlay (obviously)! Instead of one timeline, there are now infinite parallel realities co-existing side by side. Every time a character leaves their house and walks through the dark zone to the street, they don't necessarily return to their original house. They inadvertently cross into an alternate timeline version of the house. So, that's as much of the setup as I'll reveal - any more will start to give away the unfolding events and surprises. Be ready for quirky stuff, paranoia, panic, blackmail and violence!

It's a tidy little thriller which probably spends too much time on the getting-to-know-you stage in the first act as characters yack about their background and life experiences, much of which really isn't needed for the thrills and spills later. Still, no worries - it's short and tight enough at an hour and a half, and apart from that, the pacing is about right. Probably multiple watches would help most people (who are not physicists) to get their heads round it all as the reveals come along!

It's pretty well-acted by the cast, especially Emily Baldoni (Five Feet Apart) in the lead as Em, but also Maury Sterling (Kevin), Nicholas Brendon (Mike), Lorene Scafaria (Lee), Elizabeth Gracen (Beth), Hugo Armstrong (Hugh), Alex Manugian (Amir) and Lauren Maher (Laurie). The handheld camerawork throughout was pretty annoying, but I guess there was a budget constraint here - and maybe also the director wanting the point of view to be, mostly, in amongst the characters to try and get us to feel the tautness. A lot of the film is in the dark after the power is cut and candles come out, which helped the budget too with regards to lighting, I guess, but also certainly adding atmosphere.

Anyway, it's a nifty little thriller, now available to watch all over the place on streaming, so why not test yourself to see if you can keep up, need a second viewing, watch an explainer video on YouTube - or head for night school for a physics degree!

The Death of Robin Hood (2026) - A Guest Review by Chad Dixon

This is a new cinema release from Director Michael Sarnoski (A Quiet Place: Day One). "NOT ANOTHER ONE" I hear you cry..! Yes, apparently there are still stories to be told regarding the infamous bandit of Sherwood Forest. The latest non Englishman cast in the lead role is Hugh Jackman. With a Yorkshire lilt this time, that's definitely an improvement from his countryman's effort in 2010. Of whom performed it with multiple accents that seemed to cover the entire British Isles.

In the autumn of his life and set in the Winter of northern England 1247, we first see the grey bearded Robin by a camp fire at night. His heavy layered clothes filthy with the mud of the landscape. Approached by a desperate young woman begging for food, he throws her a meaty morsel in the whistling wind. Later when he seems asleep, she creeps up on him from behind with the intention to rob or worse but she's met with a lightning dagger to the side of the throat. "I smelled you coming" he murmurs, as he twists the knife and ends her life.

The next morning in the falling snow we see him burying the diminutive body under a pile of rocks. The view from directly above pans away and we see multiple graves on the hillside. This is not the Merry Man of whom we've been told many good stories. He is a ruthless murderer and every death shows on his drawn, grizzly face.

Later that day, a tall, blood-stained man looms menacingly out of the mist. He recognises the silhouette as his old comrade Little John (Bill Skarsgård). "I need your help." He then goes on to spin a tale of a redheaded wife and daughter that he's been forced to leave behind on a small holding not far away, by her angry kinsman. "They are my life." Robin agrees to help and clutching his trusty bow and arrows, they both prepare for a surprise raid under the cover of the coming night.

If you've seen The Northman (2022), starring Bills Brother, Alexander Skarsgård, then that experience should tell you enough about the graphic mud, blood and violence at the beginning of this film. But I don't think that I could have sat comfortably through a full two hours and twenty minutes of that, as it would be a relentless. Even though the fighting is all in context, thankfully the pace changes about a third of the way through when John has to take his badly wounded and delirious comrade to an island of refuge. He says that the Priory of St Clement is run by a prioress who has magical healing powers. Robin is left on the front step of the ancient looking stone facade as John and his young daughter immediately leave to row back to the mainland.

When he wakes the next morning in a quiet room and comfortable bed, his wounds bandaged and a wooden splint on his broken leg, Robin sees properly the kind and young face of the prioress that took him in for the first time. The clean, headscarved and smiling visage belongs to Jodie Comer. She asks his name. He deliberately lies: "Randolph". "Bridget." She replies. A short montage of rehab begins as with a strong wooden crutch we see the bearded man slowly regaining his strength. One day she says "go as far as you please". He slowly hobbles out of the quiet room to explore the castle like priory. The breeze is gentle and the bright sun is warm on his face. It must be Spring now. There are other nuns and children playing in the garden behind the Priory. In his mind he feels it's time for some reflection regarding the choices he has made in his later life.

There is a heavily bandaged leper on the island too played by Murray Bartlett but you only see his eyes. He initially warns Randolph not to harm anyone there, under threat of death, but eventually things become amicable. There is definitely good on-screen chemistry between Jackman and Comer. Both chameleons in the many various roles they've inhabited thus far, they, and the whole cast play totally credible characters in this harsh, mid thirteenth century England backdrop. A special mention for the young actor Faith Delaney who plays John's daughter, Little Margaret, who's return to the island later galvanises Robin's determination to make those positive changes in his remaining life.

The cinematography throughout is excellent and the rugged island location looks especially stunning on the big screen. Without giving away any spoilers the clue is in the title, so nothing really to hide here, but the story is compelling and I'm glad that the master archer aspect still plays an important part. All in all, I felt that this was quite a bit better than the last few Robin Hood centric feature film offerings we've had to endure.

The Dog Stars (2026) - A Guest Review by Chad Dixon

This is the latest Science Fiction cinema release from veteran director, Ridley Scott, who's output seems to be speeding up in his later years. It's 2035 and the World is a few years on the other side of a devastating flu pandemic that has wiped out most of humanity. The remaining survivors have mostly left the big cities and are now scattered thinly throughout the rural areas and wilderness.

Hig (Jacob Elordi), is a mechanic and together with his trusty German Shepherd Jasper, flies regular supply runs to Denver in an old repaired Cessna light aircraft. Based at an abandoned small airfield in Erie, Colorado, which he shares with Bangley (Josh Brolin). He travels more than is necessary as the city was his home with his now deceased wife and infant. They are still constantly on his mind and these visits to his old family house is his only solace in this otherwise unrecognisable empty world.

Bangley is extremely comfortable with this arrangement, as together with a good supply of food and drink, they are well armed against gangs of violent roaming scavengers that periodically come through their location. However, Hig is constantly scanning the radio waves, in hope of finding something better. Maybe a bigger community, like the group of self sufficient Mennonites that live in a lush valley a few miles away that he often drops in on on his way back from Denver. It might feel more like living again rather than just surviving. One day he decides he has to go and loads up enough supplies, takes Jasper and flies off.

This really looks like Ridley Scott has watched a few episodes of 'The Last of Us' and/or 'The Walking Dead' and thought "I'm going to do a feature film in that genre". As a result, this feels just like an extended but much less interesting episode of one of those shows. There are fairly ok performances by everyone that includes Guy Pearce and Margaret Qualley as a father and daughter Hig lands near when his plane has some minor issues. But just like lots of Mr Scott's recent offerings, the script is quite poor so heavily relies on the visuals. Which here are various panoramas of the Rocky Mountains and shot mostly from the air, look breathtaking on the big screen. But otherwise this, just under two hour story is a very mediocre effort.

1,000th Blog Post! The Salmon of Salmagundi!

When I first started writing here (and porting my posts over from Google+ when it closed its doors in 2018), I didn’t set out with a grand plan to get to any particular number - I just ploughed on through when the urge took me and I felt as though I had something to say! There was no calendar, no strategy and certainly no counter running!

I just wanted a space to put thoughts down, tinker with things that interested me and share whatever happened to be occupying my time. Today, this post happens to be number 1,000. If you didn't know, a salmagundi, by definition, is a miscellany - a dish composed of many disparate ingredients mixed together. Looking back across the archive, the blog has certainly lived up to its name. Its name and mine! The Salmon of Salmagundi! I don't have an exact record of when I posted my first post in Google+ but it's now well over 10 years - and possibly 15 - ported across here in the summer of 2018.

If you were to lay out every entry side-by-side, it would look less like a single publication and more like the top of a well-used workbench! A large chunk of those thousand posts has been dedicated to hardware - mobile phones, foldables, e-ink tablets, custom ROMs, obscure gadgets and the endless pursuit of the setup that actually works! We’ve seen the smartphone market evolve from quirky, experimental form factors into polished slabs of glass, only to bend and fold themselves into new shapes all over again. I’ve always found as much enjoyment in taking software apart or tweaking a niche budget device as I have in unboxing a flagship. For every review of a polished mainstream phone, there’s been an entry dedicated to coaxing a few more years of life out of a classic piece of kit, swapping operating systems or testing whether a paper-like screen really lives up to the hype.

Then there is the music. If tech represents the modern, restless itch to see what’s coming next, the music posts have always been about slowing down. Dropping the stylus onto a vinyl record forces a different kind of attention. Over the years, I’ve used these pages to talk through album pressings, soundscapes, audio gear and the sheer tactile satisfaction of physical media. Whether dissecting the production details on a classic album or detailing a pre-amp tweak, those posts have always felt like taking a break from the noise of the digital world to just sit back and listen. My real enjoyment has come from the resurgence of vinyl LPs though and I've had great fun over the years re-collecting what was lost from back in the day - and sharing that nostalgia here.

And, of course, the films and television. My reviews here have never been about chasing whatever blockbuster is currently dominating the multiplex. Instead, Salmagundi has been a place for digging into the side alleys of cinema - indie thrillers, oddball horror, European cinema, lost sci-fi gems and the occasional film that left me wondering what on earth the director was thinking! Writing about film is always a nice counterweight to tech hardware. A phone is measured in gigabytes, battery cycles and refresh rates; a film is measured by whether it kept you gripped for ninety minutes or made you want to drop a brief, honest summary onto the blog the moment the credits rolled. I also, now and again, add a guest review from one of our community pals, who have penned a review of their own and want somewhere online to post it.

Between the major categories lie the posts that don't fit anywhere else - the odd tools, the desk arrangements, the podcast companion notes for Whatever Works and the small observations on day-to-day projects. Those are often the most fun to write. They capture the immediate moment: fixing a piece of audio kit, setting up a new workflow or simply sharing a thought that didn't belong in a formal show recording. And speaking of podcasts, I always publish a list each month here in my blog of what the team and I have been recording and getting out there into podcast land. More spicy ingredients for that Salmagundi!

Reaching 1,000 posts isn't a finish line; it’s just a nice milestone on the road. The core appeal of running a blog like this hasn't changed since post No. 1. It remains a personal, independent corner of the web - free from algorithms dictating what ought to be written and driven entirely by genuine curiosity. To anyone who has dropped by to read a single review, leave a comment, agree or disagree with a film take, or follow along through the podcasts: thank you for your interest and support. Here’s to the next batch of tech, vinyl, films and whatever else happens to land on the desk next week!

Most of what I write here ends up in our MeWe Social Groups as well, so do check those out via the links here on my blog - and feel free to tune into any of our audio podcasts that takes your fancy. We always have a lot of fun, whatever the topic, and you'll be welcome along.

About Elly (2009)

This Iranian film was originally entitled Darbareye Elly and was directed by Asghar Farhadi, who won an Oscar in 2012 for his 2011 film A Separation (the first time an Iranian filmmaker had done so). He has gone on to win various other awards since. But leaping back to this film, it's a psychological mystery-drama that says much about social ethics, deceit, Iranian culture and personal responsibility.

Only one guess needed to work out why I was here really - I'm a big fan of Golshifteh Farahani (VTC, Hood Witch, The Night Eats the World, Paterson, Alpha) - links to my reviews! She plays Sepideh, the (social) leader of a group of middle-class university folk and their young families from Tehran. She's organised a three-day getaway for the crowd to a small, but fairly isolated resort on the Caspian Sea coast, which is about 60 miles to the north of the capital. The journey has taken them about three or four hours. Sepideh has secretly invited Elly (Taraneh Alidoosti), her daughter’s quiet playschool teacher, with the goal of setting her up with Ahmad (Shahab Hosseini), a friend of the group visiting from Germany, who is recovering from a painful divorce.

When they get there, the villa they usually book and use is only available for one night due to a booking error, so after much negotiation, the local people find them a fairly run-down bungalow right on the beach next to the fairly wild and often active sea. They grasp the task of making the most of it, despite the foul-up and the work they have to put in to make this bungalow in any way habitable. But they do - and cheerfully treat that itself as an adventure. They end up playing games, dancing and teasing each other - seizing the day (as Robin Williams might have said)!

However, Elly appears somewhat reserved and repeatedly mentions that she needs to return home after one night because of her sick mother - but Sepideh hides her luggage and does everything she can to prevent her from leaving. She's not going to have her matchmaking activities taken away lightly!

The next morning, while everyone's playing games and enjoying the break, Elly keeps an eye on the children playing near the water. Moments later, a couple of children run to the men playing volleyball, shouting and screaming that the young boy is in trouble in the water. Everyone drops everything and races into the sea in order to find and save the boy, which they eventually do, and everyone breathes a sigh of relief. However, when the panic subsides, the group realises Elly is missing. They fear that she could have drowned trying to save the boy, but hope that she's rejected Sepideh's pleadings, left her bag behind and headed back off to her mother in Tehran.

There's no mobile phone signal where they are, but they can get one by driving a little way down the road and/or using a landline in the house of the people who had organised the rental. They can't get through to good information from Tehran as to whether or not Elly is back there. As hours pass without a body or any sign of her, the initial panic turns into internal paranoia and blame. The friends begin to question who Elly actually was/is - they realise none of them, even Sepideh, even knows her full name.

This is the meat of the film and story - as we spend time amongst the characters as layers of deceit unravel, and information is kept back from each other - especially what Sepideh knows about Elly's situation at home and why she's trying to set her up with Ahmad. Social panic breaks out between them as they try to decide what to do. In the meantime, the local makeshift sea-rescue team head out in a very small boat, but have to give up the search quickly because of the weather and conditions putting them at risk.

As snippets of information and backstory creep out, the men in the group become furious with Sepideh and the brassy plan she's trying to hatch, especially when it becomes clear by now that she hardly knows Elly at all. It turns out that Elly is, in fact, engaged to a man - but has secretly told Sepideh that she doesn't want him - but can't shake him off. Now, apparently in Iranian culture, hostessing a married/engaged woman on a weekend trip to meet another man carries severe moral and legal implications. So yes, to protect their own reputations and avoid scandal, should it turn out that Elly is dead, the group starts turning on Elly, accusing her of being dishonourable or manipulative.

The group pressures Sepideh to lie to save Elly's memory (should she turn out to be dead) and spare everyone the shame. So it all gets very socially (and legally/morally) complicated because nobody (at least at first) is willing (or able) to come out and tell the truth of what's happened to various people who are now becoming interested in the situation. I'll say no more than that in terms of plot and what unfolds, because, yes, the main thrust and focus of the film is very much about the group processes and navigating the best outcome for everyone - bearing in mind that they still don't know if Elly is dead or back with her mother (whom, incidentally, she didn't tell about this trip - for the cultural and practical reasons above).

There is much handheld camerawork throughout the film as shooting often darts around the rooms as the characters interact with each other trying to find a solution and the truth. For once, it does feel like it's probably the right way to use a handheld camera, but it does eventually get a bit much (for me at least)! The location is great though and claustrophobia reigns as the anxiety and unpredictability of the situation rolls out - and for much of the film, we're in the dark as to the real facts as much as most of the group members. So it's got a bit of a 'whodunit' feel to it - and certainly mystery.

The whole cast are great in their performances, including the children, but the star of the show clearly is Golshifteh and she commands every scene that she's in, totally convincingly. Which is most of them! Incidentally, About Elly was one of her final Iranian films before she moved to France due to political tensions with Iranian authorities over her career choices outside Iran.

The director deliberately omitted a traditional musical score, relying instead on the sounds of crashing waves and ocean winds to build atmosphere and tension, certainly throughout the second half of the film - and it works well. It's a super film, but sadly not available on any streaming service just now. I was able to pick up the DVD in a second-hand online shop in the UK and I'm sure it will be shown on some TV channels on rotation. Recommended.

Cape Fear (2026, 1962 and 1991)

I went into this wondering how they were going to stretch a tight, film-length thriller into a ten-episode TV show - and how on earth Javier Bardem could match Robert De Niro's dark and disturbing central character. I was surprised and delighted in one case, but not in the other. It's on Apple TV and can be binged if you fancy it.

Unlike the original film and novel where Max Cady is a convicted sex offender, this reimagines Javier Bardem’s Max Cady as a man who has just served 17 years in prison for the brutal murder of his pregnant wife, Melissa. Released back into society, Cady is bizarrely treated by some corners of the public and a documentary crew as a folk hero and a victim of a miscarriage of justice.

At the centre of his resentment are attorney Anna Bowden, played by Amy Adams (Big Eyes) and her husband, prosecutor Tom Bowden played by Patrick Wilson (Molly's dad in Fargo)! Years prior, Anna served as Max's defence counsel and pushed him into a harsh plea deal, while Tom helped put him away. Adding to the heavy psychological web, it is revealed that Anna and Max share a complicated past and Anna secretly - for reasons that come out in the show - rushed Max’s plea deal through and got him locked away.

The middle stretch of the ten episodes slows down significantly and gets kinda talky, leaning into updated themes of misinformation and character back-stories, not present in previous depictions of the story. Cady systematically inserts himself into the Bowdens' lives, exploiting existing fractures, sowing intense paranoia between Tom and Anna and targeting their children, Zack (Joe Anders) and Natalie (Lily Collias). The psychological torture culminates in brutal ways - such as Zack being targeted and manipulated - while Cady builds a public persona, even managing to launch a restaurant named Melissa & Adam dedicated to his lost family.

As the series stretches into its final episodes, the slow-burn pacing of the middle bit explodes into action during a Category 5 hurricane, like in the film, hitting Savannah, Georgia - unlike the 1991 film, where the finale, you will remember, is at Cape Fear on the boat. Before confronting the Bowdens directly, Cady tracks down his estranged family (again, more padding) on a houseboat, featuring his abusive, institutionalising, religion-nutty father Robert (played by the scary and sinister Ron Perlman) and, at the risk of giving too much away, Juliette Lewis (Natural Born Killers, From Dust Till Dawn, Husbands and Wives) pops up in a similarly dark persona - an interesting hook into the 1991 film, where she plays the family's daughter so well.

In the finale, all the threads are pulled together and yes, it is a much more complex plot (partly because of said padding to make it a longer story for the ten episodes) where the strands reside - but it has a satisfying outcome in many ways as we work out how the puzzle fits together. The pacing, apart from that middle slow-down, is tackled well with reveals placed where they needed to be in order to raise tension and suspense, usually culminating in episodic cliffhanger endings!

Lily Collias (in the film's Juliette Lewis role as the family daughter) plays Natalie brilliantly well - in fact, she almost steals the show throughout, frankly (much like Juliette Lewis in the film). Natalie is not as green and naive as Lewis's Danielle (the daughter in the film), but rather street-wise and confident. They do share the same vulnerability, however, in terms of wanting to push boundaries set down by controlling parents - and thus finding an audience for the always-menacing and threatening Max. So yes, to my second fear at the outset (perhaps my Cape Fear!); Bardem is terrific, as he usually is in all his acting engagements. He has developed his character - not sure by how much, as he seems to also have been on the production team, alongside Martin Scorsese (another link as director of the 1991 film) and Steven Spielberg, alongside Adams, too.

Directors of the episodes were different people and included Morten Tyldum (The Imitation Game, Defending Jacob), Reed Morano (The Handmaid's Tale), Trey Edward Shults (Waves), Stephen Williams (Watchmen) and Jonathan van Tulleken (Shōgun) - so much to look out for there in terms of shooting style and, well, yes, direction! It really is very well done, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself throughout, despite the slow-down midway to pad it out. It's edge-of-the-seat stuff mostly, gripping TV - what we've come to expect from Apple!

I do think that Bardem and Collias were the stars of the show for my final takeaway, but that might well have also been true for the respective characters' actors, Lewis and De Niro, in the 1991 film. It's highly recommended by me - and now I'm off to watch the 1991 film again, and also the 1962 version with Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum, which I've not visited in decades. Good stuff. And great telly!

The 1962 Film

Having now journeyed back to the 1962 black-and-white original, it is fascinating to see how differently the material was handled before being stretched into modern prestige television. Directed by J. Lee Thompson and dripping with heavy, high-contrast shadows and sharp lighting, the film wears its stylistic influences proudly on its sleeve - playing with a deeply Hitchcockian, classic film noir atmosphere.

Story-wise, things are far more straightforward and streamlined than the 2026 series or Scorsese's 1991 remake (which I shall rewatch next and add thoughts about here). Gregory Peck plays Sam Bowden (not Tom) and his connection to Robert Mitchum’s Max Cady is refreshingly simple: Sam wasn't a complex defence attorney tangled in a web of past secrets, but merely the lone eyewitness who put Cady away.

The domestic setup also belongs firmly to another era; Sam’s wife is a classic 1960s housewife who relies entirely on her husband, a stark contrast to Amy Adams’ fiercely capable, modern incarnation in the TV show. Meanwhile, the daughter, Nancy, is only a single child (unlike the three children in John D. MacDonald’s original novel, The Executioners) and the film subtly plays into Cady's predatory nature with costume design choices that highlight her youth juxtaposed against adult vulnerability.

While Robert Mitchum is wonderfully rough-ready, menacing and manipulative as Cady, he ultimately lacks the chaotic, magnetic theatricality that Javier Bardem (or Robert De Niro) brought to the role. Peck is solid as the upstanding moral compass - and it's a treat to spot Telly Savalas in action - but the narrative moves at a much punchier pace, culminating precisely where you expect: in and around the boat at Cape Fear. It is a wonderful time capsule of 1960s suspense, proving that the core cat-and-mouse game has always had incredible legs, no matter how much the creators choose to pad or prune it.

The 1991 Film

Having now rewatched Martin Scorsese’s 1991 adaptation after many years, I think it takes the crown as the most utterly enjoyable of the lot. Scorsese really nailed the storytelling here, delivering a masterclass in slick direction, escalating suspense and visual flair. What sets this version apart above all else is the relentless, suffocating tension. The 1962 original was a tight noir thriller and the 2026 series a sprawling psychological puzzle, but Scorsese turns the narrative into an absolute pressure cooker.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the drama theatre scene between Robert De Niro’s Cady and Juliette Lewis’s Danielle. It is an extraordinary piece of cinema - deeply uncomfortable, fraught with danger and charged with incredible dramatic tension. Lewis is simply amazing, bringing a delicate balance of teenage vulnerability and awkward curiosity that deservedly earned her an Oscar nomination.

De Niro’s Max Cady is a terrifying, muscular, tattoo-laden force of nature - far nastier and more unhinged than Mitchum, yet magnetic enough that you can't look away. The acting across the entire board is top-tier (Nick Nolte and Jessica Lange play the fractured Bowden couple brilliantly), but we can also enjoy the crossover appearances from the original 1962 cast. Seeing Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum and Martin Balsam show up in inverted or supporting roles is a wonderful tip of the hat to cinematic history. With a tight script, brilliant sets and Elmer Bernstein’s haunting adaptation of Bernard Herrmann’s score, Scorsese crafted a thriller that holds you by the throat from start to finish.

Summary & Final Thoughts

Stepping back to look across all three takes on John D MacDonald’s story, it’s remarkable how well this central cat-and-mouse dynamic holds up across different eras and formats...

1962 Film A sharp, atmospheric, film noir time capsule. Driven by a straightforward moral clash between Gregory Peck and a menacing Robert Mitchum, it moves with relentless efficiency and pure 1960s suspense.

1991 Film The standout peak for sheer cinematic thrill. Scorsese amps up the psychological horror and technical craftsmanship, fueled by De Niro’s terrifying Cady and Juliette Lewis’s breakout performance.

2026 Series A modern, expanded prestige-TV reimagining. While it slows down mid-way to weave in backstories, family drama and modern media themes, Javier Bardem and Lily Collias deliver commanding performances that keep the 10-part mystery gripping right through to its stormy conclusion.

Whether you prefer the stark black-and-white noir of '62, the electrifying high-wire tension of '91, or the complex character webs of '26, Cape Fear remains one of the most enduring and adaptable suspense stories ever put to screen.

The End of Oak Street (2026) - A Guest Review by Chad Dixon

This is a science-fiction adventure film from Bad Robot Productions that has recently had its cinema release. Set in 1982 in a suburban town in Michigan - looking not dissimilar to the neighbourhood in E.T. - Oak Street is having a summer party with lots of happy fun going on. 

Looking like a model nuclear family from the outside, things aren't hunky-dory in the Platt household at the moment. There is friction between Gregg, the father (Ewan McGregor), and his wife Denise (Anne Hathaway) over him working excessively long hours. Meanwhile, their two kids, Audrey (Maisy Stella) and younger brother Brian (Christian Convery), are noticing their parents' issues and are worried about where they may lead.

However, these family issues will soon pale into insignificance as things in the neighbourhood take a very strange turn the following night during a heavy rainstorm. Brian is woken by some very bright flashing lights and sounds like heavy thunder. He then wakes his sister and they both start to hear unfamiliar, animal-like noises in the distance.

When morning finally comes, there is a total power outage affecting the entire street, and they also notice that the ambient temperature outdoors seems to have dramatically risen. They then discover that Starbuck, the family's treasured German Shepherd, has gone missing from his tether in the back garden, sending the parents out in the family car to look for the beloved pet.

The trailer for this summer release has been around for ages, so I don't think many who have heard of the film are unaware that the main premise is that the entire neighbourhood has somehow teleported back in time to the Cretaceous period, based on the dinosaurs we see. So, as the growing terror of the gradual invasion of prehistoric beasties builds, the family have to learn how to survive, and that mutual fear seems to bring them closer.

With a surprisingly short running time of 1h 40m, this is a quirky film as we never really find out why this time jump has happened, but the sight of extremely well-rendered dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes - including pterosaurs - running and flying around the streets and causing all sorts of havoc was very entertaining. The acting and the relationship between the son and daughter characters felt genuinely heartwarming as they clumsily negotiate the frightening situation unfolding outside when they get separated from their parents.

McGregor is the one who seems not to fit here, as I can't imagine why one of many American leading men wasn't cast in his role instead. It has been a busy year for Hathaway after major roles in The Devil Wears Prada II and the recent Nolan blockbuster, Odyssey - she is the one who carries this film, as it's her character who makes the tough decisions at the end. Although many humans meet their demise, it's not visually gory, making it suitable for family viewing. To sum up, it's great cinema entertainment, and you just know that J.J. Abrams is watching carefully to see if he can turn this idea into another money-spinning franchise!

The Devil's Mouth (2026)

Directed by Jeff Wadlow (Truth or Dare, Fantasy Island) under the Amazon MGM Studios banner, this creature-feature sharkathon is littered with young B-movie actors and actresses who are generally annoying - irritating pretty much anyone likely to spend an evening digesting this tripe! The most annoying of the lot was Max, played by Lana Condor, of whom she later said that she played the character as written. She mentioned that Max was supposed to be an overbearing, controlling friend whose toxic dynamic with Sara collapses under pressure. So I guess that’s good acting, then - and the irritation actually lies with the writer(s)!

If there is a saving grace in terms of a reduction in annoyance, it probably lies with Kathryn Newton (Freaky, Abigail), who plays Max’s friend Sara. She’s clearly the best actress here (though don't get too excited, as the bar is set exceptionally low)! Nico Hiraga (James, Max's boyfriend), Tommi Rose (Adrienne), Gavin Casalegno (Greg) and Tayme Thapthimthong (Wat) make up the rest of the troupe.

The first thing to say is that you really, really can skip the first 30 minutes of this film (unless you want to look at babes in bikinis and muscular young men for kicks). We get a group of five American college grads controlled by the aforementioned bossy Max and her submissive friend Sara (who has paid for the trip for everyone). One exception to the "skip-the-first-half-hour" rule is a scene in which one of them gets attacked by jellyfish and left behind to suffer as the boat speeds off - only for it to be ruthlessly edited to her suddenly being rescued and back in the group!

Local diver Wat warns them about a recent storm surge that has disrupted the waterways, but brave (at this stage) Max insists the group venture into 'The Devil's Mouth' - a flooded, unmapped subterranean cave network. Under-equipped and wearing little more than swimwear, the group heads deep into the dark tunnels. Once deep inside the claustrophobic chambers, the group discovers that the recent storm washed marine wildlife inland. While most saltwater life died off, a massive, highly aggressive bull shark survived and claims the freshwater cavern as its hunting ground!

Panic quickly erupts as the shark starts eating them (or parts of them) one by one while they try to regroup and work out an escape route. As oxygen runs low and daylight fades, the surviving members of the group are forced into narrow, flooded squeeze-tunnels to find a way out. Wedged, trapped, and relying on Sara's newfound level-headedness, adventure, scares and potential drownings set the tone for much of the rest of the film as she leads the attempt to escape the attention of the shark. I'll leave you to discover who (if anyone) survives and what happens (if anything) to the shark!

The real star of the film is the subterranean setting, with its claustrophobic tunnels and fairly well-done fake rock sets - generating far more tension than the poorly rendered CGI shark. The film gives plenty of nods to The Descent, 47 Meters Down, Jaws (though it feels like an embarrassment to mention that fine work in the company of this), and more. It's been done so many times before - often very similarly.

This is certainly a 'Friday night after the pub' film where you can chat with your mates while it plays. No real attention is needed; just look over during the action-based parts and the gore (of which there isn't much, keeping the age rating down for a broader audience). For the kind of film it is, I guess it could have been worse - just not by much! Whatever you do, don't pay extra to watch it - wait until it's streaming as included on Prime Video if you fancy the challenge (and/or have had enough Friday beers)!

The Corpse of Anna Fritz (2015)

This tight little 76-minute Spanish indie thriller wastes no time plunging us into dark, uncomfortable territory. Set primarily within the cold, sterile confines of a hospital morgue, director Hèctor Hernández Vicens delivers an intense, claustrophobic thriller built around bad decisions and the catastrophic aftermath that follows.

When famous actress Anna Fritz suddenly dies, her body is brought to a city morgue awaiting an autopsy the following morning. Because she is so famous, nobody is supposed to know where the body is being kept, but word slips out - at least locally. That includes Javi and Ivan, two mates of Pau, the orderly working the late shift. Under the influence of recreational drugs, the pair talk Pau into letting them see her body.

Things then get out of hand. Encouraged by one of the friends in particular, they begin to wonder what else they can get away with - determined not to miss a 'golden opportunity' with someone so beautiful and famous. What starts as touching her body and marveling at the sheer absurdity of the situation quickly turns far darker as their impulses escalate.

Having made their choices and acted on them, a huge, unexpected turn of events completely upends the story. What began as a disturbing breach of privacy immediately spirals into the appalling fallout of their actions. Without giving away the central twist that arrives mid-film, this narrative pivot fundamentally reshapes the stakes. What follows is a relentless, edge-of-your-seat struggle where every attempted solution only deepens the characters' predicament. The film shifts gears seamlessly from a dark tale of moral decay into a tense, high-anxiety pressure cooker.

Despite the limited cast and single location, the performances carry the full weight of the suspense. Alba Ribas brings incredible vulnerability to the role of Anna the corpse, while the three male leads - Cristian Valencia, Bernat Saumell and Albert Carbó - are uncomfortably believable in their portrayals of mounting panic, paranoia and desperation. Their growing dread as they realise they cannot undo what they have done drives much of the film's frightening momentum.

While the narrative path following the twist occasionally treads familiar thriller territory, the brief runtime works entirely in its favour. There is no bloat - every scene makes things tighter and tighter!

Extremely dark in tone and unwavering in tension, The Corpse of Anna Fritz is a grim, absorbing and surprisingly effective indie thriller that makes every minute count. On the other hand, one could argue that the whole premise is a bit daft and ludicrously unlikely. But that's the joy of storytelling and cinema - escapism, tension and in this case, macabre fun! Highly recommended if you can track it down. If all else fails, there's BloodStreamTV - check it out - it's a bit like Shudder!

Frontier Crucible (2025)

This is a low-budget Western rather than a major studio feature and certainly a slow-burner for most of its two-hour runtime. Apparently, the film was an indie project made during an 18-day shoot! It feels far too long for me, with the middle section being padded out painfully. But watch it for Maxime Alexandre’s cinematography, using Monument Valley locations, and you're in for a treat.

The location speaks for itself - and staging a story from around 150 years ago in Arizona, nothing much needs to be changed, as the landscape remains the same as it is now. Watch out for aircraft in the sky and you're away! Our story centres on Merrick Beckford, played as if he were Clint Eastwood himself by Myles Clohessy. He's a quiet, traumatised former Union soldier haunted by the violent death of his wife. He is attempting to make an honest living delivering medicines down south, where there is an outbreak of an illness that remains largely undefined.

He's charged with the task by Major O'Rourke, played fleetingly by William H. Macy (Fargo), who is clearly out for a very quick payday! So off Merrick goes with two lumbering, slow horses and a wagon painted with a Red Cross, hoping to be given a wide berth by bitter Apache warriors, as his path crosses their territory. Along the trail, he comes across a stranded, broken-down and burning wagon containing a man who has been shot - Jeff, played by Eli Brown (Pretty Little Liars) - and his deeply distressed, young and pretty wife, Valerie, played by Mary Stickley. They are accompanied by an outlaw gang of sorts - three, made up of Billy McKee, his dad Charlie and the unstable, unpredictable Edmund Fisher, played respectively by Ryan Masson (The Last Stop in Yuma County), Thomas Jane and Armie Hammer (The Social Network).

Merrick reluctantly agrees to help them and as he has at least had some medical experience, so treats Jeff's bullet wound. Valerie is hugely grateful and it's clear from that moment on that there is a chemistry building between the two. She doesn't really expect her husband to live, after all! The outlaws want to head north, though, not south - for reasons disclosed later in the film - and have no transport, living under constant risk from Apache attacks. So the tension builds, as Merrick is totally intent on going south to help those people with medicines.

Stand-offs and threats take place between them as they try to negotiate with Merrick and his wagon, bribing him with money (and immorally, even more at one point), of which they seem to have plenty. When it comes to outright aggression and ultimatums, Merrick turns even more into our Clint Eastwood character, retaining the upper hand through his gun-handling skill, swift action and experience. Still morally upstanding, he doesn't want to abandon his 'patient' or his vulnerable wife, so he wrestles everyone's weapons away to make them comply and let him get on with his task - by now, wishing he'd never stopped to help in the first place! This is the middle section of the film, to which I referred, which slows to walking pace.

The tension grows, however, as the characters show their true colours and Merrick gets closer to Valerie. He tells her about his murdered wife and brother, and she kindly sympathises, as everyone struggles to survive in this inhospitable time and terrain. Eventually, they sense an Apache warrior, who turns out to be a scout. The impetuous young Billy, looking to impress his dad and make his mark as a fearless outlaw, makes a terrible mistake that sets up the film's 20-minute finale and feeds into the title.

The finale is worth waiting for as it turns into a brutal, violent siege, with Merrick all the while trying to be the calm negotiator with the Apache warriors. It turns out he is known by some of them, making him the only real bargaining tool in the box. So the questions are: will his efforts save the group, will the outlaws get their comeuppance, will Merrick 'get the girl' and will he be able to complete his assigned task for the Major?

You can probably imagine who survives and who doesn't in this stilted, formulaic Western. It sometimes comes across as a made-for-TV film, with dubious-looking close-up sets (as opposed to the splendour of the wide shots previously mentioned). The script is OK, though very talky for little reason (except to pad out the long runtime). The Merrick character is clearly set up to be - as I say for a third time - Clint Eastwood in tone and style. Yet even the unhinged, irrational characters in the mix don't seem particularly threatening or frightening up against him. At least the characters in those old Spaghetti Westerns had balls. And spunk!

I discovered through research that the reason the ending suddenly erupts is down to an uncredited writer on the script: S. Craig Zahler (the writer/director behind Bone Tomahawk and Dragged Across Concrete). The brutal, tense final act really saves the film and it looks like that might well be down to him. Largely due to that and the gorgeously shot scenery, it's a good-looking film - but as noted above, flawed and overly slow with too much dialogue. It would have been much better as a 90-minute outing. Still, it's held together by a strong-enough supporting cast and a violent, effective final act.

The Lie (2018)

This rather predictable thriller was written and directed by Veena Sud, creator of the hit American remake of the Scandinavian series The Killing. The Lie marks a mini-reunion, as Mireille Enos (who plays the mother, Rebecca) starred in The Killing under Sud's direction. The film is also an American remake of the 2015 German film Wir Monster (We Monsters), written and directed by Sebastian Ko and Marcus Seibert.

Divorced father Jay, played by Peter Sarsgaard (Presumed Innocent, The Bride) is driving his 15-year-old daughter Kayla, played by Joey King (the first time I've seen her since Fargo, where she played Colin Hanks' character's spunky daughter), to a weekend ballet retreat. En route, they spot Kayla's friend Britney, played by Devery Jacobs (Reservation Dogs), waiting at a snowy bus stop and offer her a lift. During the short trip, we see Britney briefly flirting with Jay while Kayla looks on disapprovingly in isolated rejection.

During a break for a pee in a remote, snow-covered forest, Jay hears Kayla scream. He runs over to find Kayla sitting distraught on the ledge of a bridge above a rushing river. Kayla tearfully confesses that she pushed Britney off the bridge into the water after an argument. Unable to find Britney’s body in the icy river, Jay panics. Rather than calling the police, he takes Kayla and Britney’s left-behind purse straight to his ex-wife Rebecca, played by Mireille Enos (who we have recently seen in For All Mankind), an attorney.

Desperate to protect Kayla from prison, Jay and Rebecca attempt to hide the crime. They decide to frame Britney’s father, Sam, played by Cas Anvar (The Expanse). Sam phones the police because he gets the distinct impression, quite rightly, that the three of them are covering something up! They falsely tell police detectives that Sam was abusive towards Britney (Jay had earlier seen a scar on her face while in the car) and when quizzed, Kayla also confirmed that her friend had told her that her dad hit her sometimes. Later, when Sam confronts the family, demanding to talk to Kayla, Jay and Rebecca try to bury Britney’s phone on Sam's property to frame him.

At this point, things go from bad to worse, largely because Sam's interference with their plan forces them to regroup and rethink what to do. It turns out that Jay also lost his phone in the river that day, which adds to the potential mayhem! Jay and Rebecca really get stuck into the cover-up at this point and make even more irrational decisions, leading to catastrophic actions to protect their daughter - which I'll leave for you to discover as the story unfolds. As I said at the outset, you won't need much brainpower to work out the twists and turns, nor what is really behind it all in the end, which is doled out during the emotional finale.

The film was shot in and around Toronto (doubling for New York state) by cinematographer Peter Wunstorf and the film makes great use of the landscape in a Fargo-esque way! It all feels like a 'cold' tale and there is often tight interior framing and focusing that adds to the tension and suspense. Not bucketloads, but some of the scenes are a little edgy for sure as the realisation of what is going on closes in tightly on the characters involved!

Peter Sarsgaard, Mireille Enos and Joey King perform their parts admirably well, particularly in those later emotional scenes during the reveals. The rest of the players do their bit too, adding to that sometimes chilly, tense atmosphere. A tidy little thriller on Amazon Prime Video, a few years old now, so you should have no trouble tracking it down.

Calvaire (2004)

Directed by Belgian filmmaker Fabrice Du Welz, this film is completely bonkers - just as we have come to expect, at least occasionally, from content on the Shudder channel. In a good way! It's clearly a horror of sorts, centred around a French travelling entertainer who breaks down one rainy night. Unluckily for him, it is in the middle of a rural community of complete fruit-loops who inflict a nightmare experience upon him!

We join the film during a relatively sane event staged by Marc Stevens, a decidedly mediocre performer played by Laurent Lucas, as he entertains a grateful crowd at a local nursing home. As the show winds down and he is back in his dressing room, eager elderly fans throw themselves at him, hoping for a bit more than what he delivered on stage! He quickly jumps into his van and heads off towards his next gig down south.

Driving through the heavily forested Ardennes region in torrential rain, Marc's van breaks down. He encounters Boris (Jean-Luc Couchard), a mentally unstable man wandering the woods looking for his lost dog, Bella. Boris leads Marc to an isolated, dilapidated inn owned by Paul Bartel (Jackie Berroyer). Bartel seems welcoming and reveals that he is a former stage comedian whose wife, Gloria, abandoned him years ago, causing him to retire into obscurity.

Bartel promises to fix Marc’s van, but secretly sabotages it, steals Marc's belongings and slashes his tyres! Bit by bit, we witness Bartel sinking further into insanity as he purposely blocks any attempts Marc makes to leave - masking it all with kindness, meals and home comforts while Marc awaits his repaired van. However, Bartel comes to believe that Marc is actually his missing wife, Gloria, and uses social pressure to get him to sing for him. During the daytime, Marc goes off for a walk at one point and stumbles across a bunch of locals doing unspeakable things to various animals!

This is the point at which things go properly pear-shaped for Marc. Boris becomes even more bizarre in his behaviour and Bartel effectively captures and detains Marc - eventually moving from persuasion to force and abuse. Marc attempts to escape into the surrounding countryside, only to realise the entire local male population is just as deeply unhinged as Bartel. In the village bar, a local (Stan le Pianiste) plays a discordant, frantic tune while all the men in town break into a hypnotic, aggressive, trance-like dance - which is actually comic, bizarre and hilarious - the highlight of the film for me!

Lots of gore follows at this point, with the local butcher in the mix. They are all enraged by Bartel and Boris, sexually frustrated and convinced that Gloria has returned and there is a woman in their midst. They fail to realise that it is actually poor Marc - by this stage dressed up in Gloria's clothes and completely unrecognisable! The finale plays out in the mist of the local marsh, where the ground is soft and treacherous, leading us towards the resolution, a few more reveals, and even more loopy goings-on!

What's interesting is that, apart from that opening scene in the nursing home, there are no women in the film - just the three lead men and the broader pack of males in the village. It's strongly implied that Gloria was the last one to have fled (or died) and that this bunch of crackpots has driven all females away, causing any chance of normal relationships, intimacy, and social structure to dissolve. The men seem to project their suppressed desire, loneliness, and basic instincts onto whatever is available - animal, vegetable or mineral!

This was Fabrice Du Welz's first film and forms the first entry in his unofficial "Ardennes Trilogy" (followed years later by Alleluia in 2014 and Adoration in 2019), all exploring obsessive, destructive love - set around the same dark forests. The cinematography is great, the visuals are striking and it was all shot on Super 16mm film apparently for a raw, grainy, sickly texture filled with dreary winter light and oppressive muddy tones! The sound design is interesting too - often simply the eerie wind rushing through the marsh and in and around the buildings. It's certainly worth seeing the film, if for no other reason than that wacky dance scene in the bar representing the collective madness of the locals! Great fun and, yes, one more time - bonkers!