Deep in the forests of Germany, there is a resort, a quaint getaway nestled right at the bottom of the Bavarian Alps. Step out of your car, and you immediately feel like you’re stepping into a postcard; you half expect men in lederhosen, hoisting large steins of Pilsner, to greet you as walk toward the lobby. It’s so picturesque that you might not notice the strange noise emanating from within the woods right next to the guest houses. It’s faint, but very shrill. Something feels weird about that sound, but then again, this region is near where the Brothers Grimm set their fairy tales. And fairy tales are often filled with monsters.
This is where Cuckoo, the creepy new film from German director Tilman Singer (Luz), takes place, and while horror movies do not necessarily rely on the holy trinity of real estate — “Location, location, location” — this setting adds immensely to the immediate feel of unease. One look, and you quickly wonder when, not if, the big bad wolf will make his or her presence known. It doesn’t help that the hotel’s inhabitants have a tendency to wander the lobby in a daze and/or start vomiting uncontrollably. Or that that the unsettling shrieking in the distance keeps getting louder, especially after dark. Or that these sonic blasts have a tendency to cause the film’s visuals to pulse and rewind everything back five to six seconds.
That’s one of the aesthetic tics that Singer utilizes to suggest something wicked this way is coming, or rather, that’s it’s already here and patiently setting a trap. Cuckoo will eventually answer your questions (most of them, anyway; there are loose ends abound). But for now, it’s content to simply unnerve you in the most stylish, Argentoesque way possible. Our guide for this Euro-horror nightmare is Gretchen (Hunter Schafer). A teenager still grieving the loss of her mother and resentful of her stepmother (Jessica Henwick) — we told you it had fairy-tale vibes — she’s been reluctantly conscripted into living in Germany with Dad (Marton Csokas), his second wife and their mute seven-year-old daughter (Mila Lieu). Gretchen would much rather be back home, playing music with her Jesus-and-Mary-Chain–ish shoegaze band. Instead, she’s stuck in Bavaria, with nothing but her bike, her bass and a butterfly knife to keep her company. Three guesses as to which of those items is going to come in real handy soon.
The resort is run by Herr König (Dan Stevens, toggling between an out-rrrrrr-ageous German accent or a better-than-decent impersonation of Christoph Waltz), who couldn’t be happier that the family has returned to his little patch of Saxon paradise. Seven years ago, Gretchen’s father and his new spouse honeymooned at the resort. Their stay resulted in her stepsister — a girl who Gretchen semi-tolerates and Herr König pays particular attention to. One afternoon, as that strange noise rings out from within the woods, the area below the child’s throat begins to rapidly flutter and she has a fit. Later that night, while Gretchen is riding home on her bike, she notice another shadow on the ground besides her own — someone seems to sprinting directly behind her, hands grasping at her shoulder. When she gets a look at her pursuer, it appears to be an older lady, wearing a trenchcoat and sunglasses long after the sun has gone down. And then shit gets really weird.
There are other, more peripheral bit of information that soon come into play, such as the fact that König has diversified his portfolio and invested in a local clinic just down the road from the resort. There’s also a former police detective (Jan Bluthardt) who’s sniffing around for answers regarding the mysterious occurrences around the joint, and has a personal connection to the what’s going on. Also, did you know that in addition to be known for popping out of clocks and warbling on the hour, the animal that gives the film its title is a “brood parasite” — as in, it lays eggs in other birds’ nests and lets them raise and nurture them as if it were their own?
Cuckoo also doubles as pretty good description of the film itself, though even that may be too mild an adjective — judges would have also accepted Batshit, Whoa! and Oh My God Wait What the Fuck?! as alternative names. Singer seems to be going for a late-period giallo vibe here, when the subgenre entered its baroque period and begin laying the more outré elements extra thick. (See: the original Suspiria.) The sunglasses and overcoat get-up of the movie’s in-house maniac also signify a love of Italy’s classic slasher-a-go-go entries, and there’s an overall lurid feeling that taps into the underbelly legacy of the best, boundary-pushing Euro-horror flicks of the 1970s and ’80s.
You don’t have to know where Cuckoo is coming from or where it ends up going, of course, to appreciate how Hunter Schafer leans into her role with both an impressive sense of commitment and enthusiastic embrace of the crazier, kookier aspects of the story. The Euphoria star has not only gone on record as being a huge horror fanatic but also that she wanted to make her mark as “a badass thriller bad bitch with a knife in her mouth” (her words, not ours), to which we can only say: Job well done. And let us officially say that we’re 100-percent behind Dan Stevens‘ ongoing career pivot from dapper leading hunk (U.K. division) to playing kooks, freaks and scenery-chewing nutjobs. The two of them hold the film up when it starts to sag in spots, or when the sensation that the creepazoid bells and whistles and over-the-top motherhood allegories are lapping the logistics becomes a tad too much. Look at it through the lens of a dual star vehicle that isn’t afraid to sacrifice coherence in the name of cheap thrills, and this bird only slightly sings off-key. Just don’t tell the Bavarian tourist board.
