British-Iranian director Babak Anvari, best known for 1980s Tehran-set horror Under the Shadow, shifts setting to modern-day Britain for Hallow Road, while maintaining the unnerving tone of real-life horror meeting the supernatural.
The film begins late at night in the home of paramedic Maddie (Rosamund Pike) and her husband Frank (Matthew Rhys); their daughter Alice (Megan McDonnell) has earlier stormed out following a tense family dinner. They receive a phone call from a distraught Alice – she has hit someone with her car and needs her parents’ help. The rest of the film plays out in Maddie’s car, as she and Frank race towards the suitably dark and creepy forest where the incident occured.
This single-location setup is used to great effect, with William Gillies’ script throwing multiple twists into the narrative that prevent it ever feeling slow. Key to this is a growing tension between the two parents, who disagree on how to handle the situation. Maddie, brutally honest, wants to encourage Alice to do everything possible to save the girl’s life, even if it means accepting responsibility. Frank wants to tell his daughter what she wants to hear, and help preserve her promising future. And just when it seems that tension has reached its peak, someone else arrives at the scene before Maddie and Frank – but who exactly is it?
With its only fault being some slightly overdramatic dialogue in this final act threatening to derail the realism, Hallow Road uses its gradually building horror conceit to interrogate how forgiving a parent should be of their child. The film retains a pleasing sense of ambiguity, never giving a firm answer to either this thematic question or to the true nature of the events that take place. But stick around to read the credits and you’ll spot a vital clue (if you hadn’t twigged it already). This is a creepy, tense horror, in a pleasingly tight 80 minutes.
HALLOW ROAD is in UK cinemas now.
