Turns out Osgood Perkins’ Longlegs isn’t the only independent serial-killer movie to make a splash this year. In late August, Strange Darling, by writer/director JT Mollner (2016’s Outlaws and Angels), landed in the US to a 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Not only that, it was warmly endorsed on X by no less than Stephen King: "It’s really terrific," wrote the horror author, "… a clever masterpiece."
Separated into six chapters (plus an epilogue) presented in non-linear fashion, this horror-thriller at first appears like it might be a bit too clever for its own good. But before long it emerges that the time-hopping, flip-flopping structure is actually in place for shrewd narrative reasons. Our initial assumptions are craftily toyed with as we’re drip-fed titbits of information while watching a one-night stand spiral into a spree of killings in the state of Oregon.
