54886: Cuckoo

Whenever I see videos of entomologists allowing ticks or leeches or some other bloodsucker to feed off them, my second reaction is one of respect. There's something powerful about being so committed to understanding another species that you let them pierce your skin and steal your goddamned blood just so you can get to know them better. That's impressive, you weirdos. But it's also horrific, and when you replace your skin with the skin of an unwitting participant in your study, well, it gets to be downright terrifying. That's not exactly what Cuckoo is about, but it's as close to the truth as I'm able to get without spoiling the whole thing. What I can tell you is that Cuckoo takes place in the present day, entirely at an alpine resort/forest preserve in Germany, and that it is delightfully unhinged.

Hunter Schafer stars as Gretchen, a 17ish year-old from the US who recently lost her mother and is now forced to live with her father, stepmother, and step-sister in Germany. We meet Gretchen and her new family en route to a remote, wooded resort in the alps. Gretchen isn't feeling it, and not just because remote German forests are where precocious kids get eaten by witches. From the jump, we see that Gretchen's father, Luis (played with exasperation by Marton Csokas), has built a life with his new wife, Beth (Jessica Henwick, who gets some terrifying scenes late in the film), and their daughter, Alma (Mila Lieu). As a new member of the family, Gretchen feels like an unwanted, unwelcome visitor, and she cannot wait to get free of them and leave the nest.

Holding her back from taking flight is a tenuous sisterly bond with her half-sister, Alma. Alma is a mute eight year-old who communicates through text-to-speech technology and ASL, and even without the power of speech, it is clear that she thinks Gretchen is the coolest human being she's ever met. Lieu's performance is endearing and vulnerable and sweet, and quite a feat for a child actor who isn't allowed to speak any lines. I did find the character somewhat problematic. She's presented as a neurodivergent individual, possibly on the Autism spectrum, but is something else entirely. What bothered me is that I couldn't tell if the filmmakers were using her "something else entierly-ness" as a metaphor for ASD and/or neurodivergence—in which case they would seem to be contributing to the stigma and otherness these people experience in the real world—or if they were saying that neurodivergence is itself a symptom for something else we don't yet understand. Regardless, the pull between Alma and Gretchen is the emotional spine of Cuckoo, and one of the biggest reasons the film works for me.

Rounding out this little fairy tale are Jan Bluthardt as the mysterious Henry, a local cop investigating strange happenings at the resort, and Dan Stevens as Herr König, the man who is quite obviously behind the strange happenings at the resort.

Can I digress for a moment? I remember when Dan Stevens was making a name for himself on Downton Abbey, riding that inside track all the way from the UK to a sweet, easy life as a heartthrob of Sunday night PBS programming. And then he blew it all up by demanding to be killed of his hit show at the end of its first season. That's insane, and baller. And just this year, I've seen him in two kinda-campy horror films, playing villains so arch they could be St. Louis's most famous landmark. (The other film being Abigail, which I highly recommend) I love his nutso career choices, as well as the smarmy charm and menace he brings to these roles. Keep it coming, Dan. You'll be this generation's Vincent Price in no time.

So, here we are. We've essentially got a monster movie set up, with a mad scientist and a Van Helsing type going at it, while the heroine is caught in the middle, beset by both sides and pushed into action. Now, as I mentioned before, I don't want to spoil Cuckoo's insane plot, but I do want to point out that viewers are in for some arresting visuals, nightmarish monster design, jarring sound cues, and just enough mystery to keep you hooked without becoming tiresome. Oh, and also a lot of vomiting.

Writer/Director Tilman Singer has created an unsettling world for Gretchen to explore. Cinematographer Paul Faltz does a beautiful job of making a simple alpine resort feel menacing and claustrophobic and inescapable, while editors Terel Gibson and Philipp Thomas keep us tied tightly enough to Gretchen so that we can feel her fear and frustration as her journey moves out of normal family psychodrama and into the realm of "batshit crazy."

The eventual catharsis at the end of Cuckoo feels well-earned, even if the overall story that got us there has some holes and leaves a few open-ended questions unanswered. The answers we do get feel pretty universal: family is what matters, and you find that family in the darnedest places. Even Germany.