Adam (Joseph Mawle) moves his family to a house in the Irish countryside as The Hallow begins. He has a nice wife (Bojana Novakovic), a beautiful child and a bunch of demonic creatures living in the backyard that want to kidnap the kid.
The creatures are a variety of tortured souls. Some of them are people who were kidnapped and transformed into slimy monsters; all of them are gross and scary. In other words, Adam picked the wrong place to live.
Writer-director Corin Hardy does good things with a small budget. When the monsters finally attack, Hardy gives the film a true sense of dread, with Adam’s plight becoming the stuff of nightmares. It’ll make you think twice before purchasing a remote home in the wilderness, and it’ll inspire you to purchase a cannon and many guns if you should opt for such a home location.
The second half of the film is full of dread, as Adam’s duties as a father and protector are put to the test. He finds out it in the worst of ways that some of the stories his neighbors told him are true. Hardy’s film owes a lot to The Descent, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark and The Shining, and it continues a good year for horror in 2015.
The Hallow is available on demand and via online sources including iTunes and Amazon.com.