I’m going to start this review by saying that I thought I was going to love it. A punk-rock horror film set in Australia in the 80s? I’m completely up for that. But as I watched Penny Lane Is Dead, I began to wonder, why make an Ozploitation film in the 2020s when horror has evolved over the past four or so decades? If you’re going to revive the style, I reckon you have to bring something new to the genre.
It’s a nightmare scenario. Expectant mother Lena (Dakota Gorman) wakes to find herself locked in the back of a moving mobile home. Disorientated and unable to summon help, she is met instead by a disembodied voice insisting that her captor is a good man and that she has been infected. In his feature-length directorial debut, Brock Bodell explores a modern take on the Little Red Riding Hood story in Hellcat (2025). There is just one problem.
Who is the Big Bad Wolf in this scenario?
As Lena fights to survive and protect her unborn child, one thing becomes certain: she has no idea what's going on. She realises that she cannot trust herself or her memories, and her already fragile grip on reality is further threatened by a shocking discovery. What the hell happened, and how did she land up in this predicament?
Throughout all of this, Hellcat wrings an impressive amount from such a limited setting, as Lena's plight becomes increasingly desperate and oppressive. Dakota Gorman shoulders almost the entire film. I never once doubted her performance as Lena, even when the narrative began to lose its footing. Todd Terry and Liz Atwater are also worth a mention, but I'll leave you to discover exactly why for yourself.
I wouldn't call this a horror exactly and so, by extension, it isn't really scary. It sits much more comfortably in thriller territory. Without venturing into spoiler territory, the central reveal ultimately fell rather flat for me. While Bodell clearly wants to wrong-foot the audience, I suspect some viewers may come away feeling that the film shifts genres without quite earning the transition.
What Hellcat is, though, is intensely claustrophobic and uncomfortable viewing. For much of the film, Lena is stuck in the back of a moving, grimy, old-fashioned mobile home and the viewer is stuck there with her through the constant rattling and tinkling of cups, pots and every other loose object inside.
Given the tiny space he was working with, cinematographer Andrew Duensing has done a great job with rich, saturated colours, giving Hellcat a genuinely cinematic look without losing sight of the grime and decay surrounding Lena. It elevates what could easily have become a visually repetitive setting.
There was plenty to like about Hellcat, but the direction the story ultimately took didn't quite work for me. I enjoyed the claustrophobic setting, the atmosphere and Dakota Gorman's performance, but the eventual reveal left me underwhelmed. It's a shame, because there is a lot to admire here and, with a different approach to the story, I could easily have been looking at a four or even five-star review.
Even so, Hellcat was a great way to spend 91 minutes and there's more than enough here to recommend it. I'm giving it an enthusiastic three out of five stars.
★★★☆☆
Scares ★★★★☆| Love ★★★☆☆ | Design ★★★★☆ | Acting ★★★★☆ | Plot ★★☆☆☆
A Shudder Original Film, Hellcat Premieres Exclusively on Shudder and AMC+ Friday 14 August
If you’re going to tackle a zombie horror these days, you need something fresh. Look at what Black Summer did in a market already overflowing with zombie lore: urgency, terror, impossible choices to survive. This Is Not a Test, set in the opening days of a zombie apocalypse, promised a sharp, emotional story about an abused teen and the slow awakening of a survival instinct after years of wishing she was dead.
Olivia Holt stars as Sloane, a traumatised teenager trapped in an abusive home when a violent zombie outbreak brings chaos to her town. She escapes her father and falls in with a group of classmates, eventually taking refuge inside their high school. It’s messy, brutal and chaotic, but This Is Not a Test seems to be trying to position itself as a cut above.
It’s a powerful concept based on the novel by Courtney Summers, a major YA author whose work should have translated into something far more impactful on screen. But it never does. I didn’t see it and, more importantly, I didn’t feel it. The best zombie films and series get under your skin. They create a mood, a lingering sense of dread that sticks with you long after the credits roll. I first fell for the genre with Open Grave, and that whole film was pure mood.
This Is Not a Test had no mood.
A lot of the problem comes down to telling rather than showing. We’re told Sloane is suicidal, that her father is abusive, that her sister left home. We see some of the abuse. Logically, it makes sense why a teen would feel hopeless. But that’s not work my brain should be doing. The film should have done that work for me.
The same applies when Sloane meets the other survivors and they move to the high school. We know some of these teens aren’t in the best headspace, but none of it really lands. This is the opening day of a zombie apocalypse after all. They’ve all already lost someone.
I expected more from these rising teen stars, but the film never gives them enough depth or direction. Froy Gutierrez (Rhys), Corteon Moore (Cary), Chloe Avakian (Grace) and Carson MacCormac (Trace) all feel like they’re trying to do what they can with thin material, especially when the film never even bothers to properly explain what caused the apocalypse.
I rarely dislike a zombie film, especially one leaning into gritty, emotional territory rather than comedy. But I felt nothing here, much like Sloane did at the start.
This is the second Olivia Holt film I’ve rated one star, the first being Heart Eyes. At this point, I’m starting to think she’s just not my cup of tea.
If you’ve made it this far reading because you too were disappointed, I’m sorry. But I can wholeheartedly recommend anything in the Walking Dead universe, or Z Nation and Black Summer.
★☆☆☆☆
A Shudder Exclusive Film, This Is Not a Test Premieres Exclusively on Shudder and AMC+ Friday 22 May 2026
What would you do to overcome writer’s block? With a looming deadline and freshly ghosted by his girlfriend, struggling horror novelist Rian (Rushabh Patel) retreats to a remote motel to finish writing his book. Caught between a storyboard populated only by the first and last scene and bouts of frenzied bathtub writing, Rian begins to hatch a story about drug counsellor Katie on the run from an increasingly violent stalker (and possibly serial killer).
It soon becomes clear that Rian’s story is unfolding in real time.
As his path collides with the real Katie, can they stop the stalker before it is too late? And what exactly is Naja, the mysterious hotel manager, hiding?
Quietly devastating and utterly spellbinding, Alex Burunova’s Satisfaction is screening at the Glasgow Film Festival this weekend. Fans of Mayor of Kingstown on Paramount+ will recognise lead actress Emma Laird from her role as Iris, and know that she doesn’t shy from difficult material, though this performance ventures into particularly dark territory.
Set against the sun-washed beauty of the Greek Isles, British composers Lola (Emma Laird) and Philip (Fionn Whitehead) exist together in a relationship defined less by love than by distance and silence. For all the tranquillity of their surroundings, an unbreachable divide spans between them. When Lola meets the enigmatic Elena (Zar Amir Ebrahimi), the fragile equilibrium between Lola and Philip begins to fracture, revealing a much darker portrait of people bound together by trauma.