Until Dawn: Movie Review

Cast: Ella Rubin, Michael Cimino, Peter Stormare, Ji-Young Yoo, Odessa A'Zion
Director: David F Sandberg

When the Until Dawn game appeared back in 2015, its adaptation of horror, third-person gaming and the butterfly effect set in motion a chain of success that saw ripples for years to come.

Now a decade on, the game's been taken as an inspiration point for a horror film that mixes survival, Groundhog Day, slasher and the zombie genres in some truly effective ways.

One year after her sister's disappearance, Clover (Rubin) and a group of her friends head to the last spot she was seen to try and piece together what happened. But within hours of arriving, they find themselves trapped in a nightmare, destined to be killed time and time again.

Until Dawn's movie is tremendously effective at building a world of unease around it - but less so at creating a level of coherence as the reasons for what's going on are revealed toward the end. It has to be said the movie feels like it rushes to some kind of conclusion, with a stream of answers coming in between a run of attacks and escapes. (And a wonderful final nod to the actual game itself).

Yet the journey to the destination is nothing short of compelling and thrilling.

From its headscratching what's going on here approach as the group finds themselves caught in a clutch of seemingly unexplainable mysteries to the moments the horror really ramps up, Until Dawn more than delivers on a promise of changing up the traditional stalker horror into something that's more disturbing and upsetting.

Each kill feels gnarly and gut-wrenching. There are moments of humour (and one series of deaths that's laugh-out-loud funny in its gory execution, despite a final scene explaining away why it happened like that) but they're deftly balanced by a kind of tension that's sickening to watch.

Complete with Easter Egg nods to the game, PlayStation Productions' approach to Until Dawn has been to deviate slightly from the expectations of those who've played it and double down on what makes a good horror work these days - mystery and uncertainty.

An effective thrill ride that impresses until it doesn't, Until Dawn deserves your time - it's a reminder what the horror genre can do when it's treated with intelligence.