Hollywood has tasked the blockbuster trio of The Devil Wears Prada 2, The Mandalorian & Grogu and Mortal Kombat II with being the primary driver of audiences to theaters during the month of May. What's lurking in the shadows and eager to feast on whatever scraps come their way during this opening month of 2026's summer movie season is a whole lot of horror movies. There are a whopping five horror movies releasing in May (which as of this writing, is more than June-August combined!) and this upcoming weekend is the only one this month that doesn't have one on the calendar. Batting leadoff in this spooky lineup is the Neon-backed supernatural/psychological chiller Hokum from Irish filmmaker Damian Mc Carthy (Oddity, Caveat). If Hokum is a harbinger of what's to come from Obsession, Passenger, Corporate Retreat and Backrooms in the coming weeks, this is going to be a very enjoyable stretch for fans of the horror genre.
The setup to Hokum is a pretty familiar one as it centers around an American writer (a really terrific Adam Scott) who travels to Ireland to spread the ashes of his deceased parents outside of the remote countryside hotel they honeymooned at, only to quick discover that this idyllic place is haunted by a witch and some other evils that aren't of the supernatural variety. Seeing another story involving a haunted hotel and tortured creatives confronting the trauma that made them miserable is going to have zero appeal to some folks out there that have had their fill of movies that are in the mold of The Shining or 1408 over the years. Safe to say, I'm not one of these people. Once Hokum settles into a groove after a pretty slow first act where it establishes the central players that are going to help make this writer's trip to Ireland unforgettable (the desk clerk who is seemingly only employed there because he's the owner's son-in-law, a psychedelic mushroom-loving drifter with a troubling past who lives in a van in the woods next to the hotel, a friendly bartender who is the only member of the hotel staff that Scott's prickly character is even somewhat nice to, the aspiring writer bellhop who is naive enough to believe that a famous author would be anything other than bluntly dismissive upon being asked if they were interested in reading a stranger's manuscript, the hotheaded groundskeeper) and a bit of folklore surrounding the witch that haunts the hotel's long decommissioned honeymoon suite, the film becomes so fucking terrifying that I didn't give two shits about any similarities it may or may not have shared with other movies.
It's been quite a bit since I've watched a haunted house movie where it felt like the main character was being haunted by a dangerous evil that could be lurking around every corner. The seemingly endless corridors and ambient wall-mounted lighting that run through the hotel are designed in a way that screams "SOMETHING EVIL LIVES WITHIN THESE WALLS" without feeling like they were explicitly built as a nightmare playground for a horror movie. Naturally, this feeling of unease and inherent creepiness intensifies when the action eventually shifts to the honeymoon suite. This long vacant space is a cavernous maze full of secret tunnels and old elevators that serve as portals to various evils that are better left unspoken until you actually see the movie. Trapping the viewer in an area where the sense of confinement and danger from the various threats the protagonist is facing aren't just seen but felt in the deepest pits of your stomach is the most surefire way to know that a horror movie has done its job and Mc Carthy finds so much success on that front that I hope the producers give him a bonus for all of the internal distress he caused through the relentlessly nightmarish materialization of his vision.
Hokum isn't quite as successful with handling the subtext around the long-held trauma that has made Scott's character the miserable loner alcoholic writer he is today. But when the movie is this scary and compelling, it becomes a lot easier to forgive a somewhat underwritten emotional arc that forces the main character to finally obtain the courage to face their inner demons. Mc Carthy is well on his way to keep on rising through the horror ranks and may he not lose sight of the meticulous visceral craftsmanship that fueled his ascent once he moves onto bigger projects.
Grade: B+
