Review: Static / Cert: 15 / Director: Todd Levin / Screenplay: Gabriel Cowan / Starring: Milo Ventimiglia, Sarah Shahi, Sara Paxton / Release Date: July 15th

A new horror film from first-time director Todd Levin provoking chills in all the right places, Static is a tense and emotional experience. It centres around a grieving couple, Jonathan (Heroes’ Milo Ventimiglia) and Addie (Person of Interest’s Sarah Shahi,) after the drowning of their 3-year-old son. Jonathan is trying to bring their lives back to normality, but this is complicated by the arrival of a young woman, Rachel (The Innkeepers’ Sara Paxton). She claims that people are chasing her but when strange things continue to happen in her presence, Addie becomes immediately suspicious. Then, when Rachel is taken from their home, the threat begins to extend to them. The film is slow paced at the beginning, but as soon as Rachel gets snatched from the house, the action begins to speed up, with the masked invaders attacking their home and Jonathan and Addie forced to run and fight for their lives.

The leading cast are very engaging. Shahi and Ventimiglia are both authentic in their grief-stricken roles providing some very sincere and emotional moments as they struggle to communicate with each other and deal with their grief. Ventimiglia, once again, shows that he has leading man potential whilst Sara Paxton’s role offers just the right amount of mystery. Levin plays on the conventions of the genre as the house and grounds become a prison, and the tension is heightened by the use of an eerie ssoundtrack and the setting of the spacious countryside where nobody is around to hear them scream. For most of its duration, Static is tense and suspenseful, the end is far from expected and, all and all, this is a most promising directorial debut.

Extras: None