There’s a dizzying amount to see and hear in German film-maker Tilman Singer’s brash style-over-substance horror Cuckoo, a film that pokes and prods and screeches with just about enough vim and volume to keep us mostly engaged. As the work of a newish-to-the-scene director, it’s a big, bold flex, and one that serves as more than ample evidence that he can be trusted to take on, and add flavour to, far more commercial movies. As proof of his ability as a writer it’s far less persuasive, a script that could generously be labelled opaque and more fairly called frequently incoherent.
How much one will be turned off by such hazy, haphazard plotting will be a matter of personal taste and in a period that’s seen the horror genre beset by films prioritising mood and atmosphere above all else, it will probably find its unbothered audience. It’s far easier to like than last month’s similarly lopsided Longlegs, another stylish yet baffling indie horror, mostly because it’s taking itself far less seriously, its charmingly goofy streak almost excusing its inevitable descent into nonsense.
