The Hole In The Ground: NZIFF Review

The Hole In The Ground: NZIFF Review

Debut director Lee Cronin's The Hole In The Ground plays with primal fears, familiar tropes and jump scares and spins them round into something compelling and deeply unsettling.

Seana Kerslake plays Sarah, who's moved to a new life in the Irish countryside, along with her son Chris. Clearly unsettled by the past, and troubled by the need to relocate, Sarah's further rattled when  a neighbour screams at Chris that he's not her son.

As the doubts and the odd behaviour start to build up, Sarah's forced into a course of action and paranoia that escalates quickly, but whose foundation is already on dodgy ground - what exactly is going on?

The Hole In The Ground may use a lot of old school ideas, crescendoing sound, and the fear of what lies in the forest, but what Cronin's crafted is something of tension, suspense, and genuine dread.

Its offbeat approach to unsettling proceedings works best as a two hander between Kerslake and James Quinn Markey, who plays Chris. Kerslake in particular is ferocious and vulnerable, tapping into every mother's fears as the slow pace unfolds, leaving the audience's imagination to run wild and jump to (wrong) conclusions.

In passing the film bears similarities to Invaders From Mars, and its paranoia of doubles, but Cronin subverts some of that to play on a mother's most basic fears. The Hole In The Ground may wobble a bit towards the end, but as a domestic horror, and a primal button-pusher, it's second to none.