McDaniel
“Cuckoo” is a parasitic tale that twists a variety of horror elements into an unforgettable nightmare.
A 17-year-old girl named Gretchen (Hunter Schafer) reluctantly moves with her father and stepfamily to Germany’s Bavarian Alps, where the proprietor of the resort town they’re in takes a special interest in the family. And after hiring Gretchen to work at the hotel’s front desk, things get weird.
She begins hearing a shrieking sound that has an incapacitating effect on everyone who hears it, her sister begins having seizures, and on her bike ride home from work one night, Gretchen is chased by a red-eyed woman.
What makes director Tilman Singer’s film memorable is it doesn’t stick to a single predictable arc. Instead, the film pivots anytime it starts to feel familiar: offering “The Shining” vibes of losing yourself in a sinister place, twisting into a mad scientist story, and ending up in the folklore of parasitic monsters. And it’s kinda great.
The film is titled “Cuckoo,” representing the breed of bird that lays its eggs in another bird’s nest, thereby having another bird unknowingly raise its babies. In that way, it’s sometimes referred to as a brood parasite.
Figuring out how that plays into the story is a twisted attack on your senses. There is some terrifying cinematography that had me pressed hard into my seat, startling screenshots that remain in my mind — like the preview shot of the shadow arm reaching for Gretchen while riding her bike.
Even more, the film makes use of sound better than any horror movie I’ve seen in some time. Natural sound like the birds in the trees are prominent, only to be symbolically invaded by distressing pitches and the inhuman shrieking, making sound a frequent distresser. And near the end of the movie when Gretchen is hiding and it’s suddenly silent, I realized not only how tense the sound had made me the whole movie, but how the sudden absence of it made me feel alone and afraid, like her.
Because there are so many horror elements in the story, the details are sometimes murky and left to the imagination. You’ll likely leave with unanswered questions. And because it’s so varied, it feels like it should be a multifaceted B-horror movie. But it’s not.
It’s absurd, but in all the right ways, and Schafer’s impressive acting had me feeling the emotions of the story, whereas a lesser performance would have had me grimacing at the insanity.
“Cuckoo” is a film that won’t easily be forgotten, lingering in your mind like the unsettling shriek that defines it.
4/5
Scott McDaniel is an assistant professor of journalism at Franklin College. He lives in Bargersville with his wife and three kids.
