Echoes of Andrzej Zulawski’s Possession and the novels of John Wyndham and Jack Finney haunt Leigh Janiak’s otherworldly chiller about newlyweds holed up in a cabin in the woods. Harry Treadaway (Paul) and Rose Leslie (Bea) are wholly convincing as the besotted couple whose life and relationship start to unravel in the remote retreat, where their dream becomes a nightmare. Ominous encounters with former acquaintances (less Straw Dogs than The Evil Dead) and strange flashlights in the woods send poor Paul spiralling into paranoia, while Bea’s affection for her husband starts to seem more and more like an act. Wisely withholding its scrungy cross-generic revelations until the final act, co-writer Janiak’s directorial debut makes confident use of limited resources to conjure creepy thrills, peering through the cracks in the couple’s imploding relationship, spying shadowy monsters lurking in the darkness.
Honeymoon review – from marital bliss to meltdown
Two newlyweds regret retreating to the woods in Leigh Janiak’s creepy debut, writes Mark Kermode