Horror films that deserve to be called truly macabre and that evoke a real sense of supernatural eeriness are a rarity, so I’m thrilled to state that writer/director Damian McCarthy’s incredible Oddity more than lives up to those standards. The Irish shocker recalls the mesmerizing ambience of classic 1970s occult horror while maintaining a thoroughly modern flavor.
Psychiatric hospital doctor Ted (Gwilym Lee) and his wife Dani (Carolyn Bracken) move into a remote country house not far from Ted’s place of work. A patient from the hospital named Olin (Tadhg Murphy) comes to the couple’s door one night when Ted is at work, claiming that Dani needs to let him in because he saw someone inside the house. Dani is then viciously murdered, and Olin is soon found dead.
Fast forward one year. Dani’s blind, psychic twin sister Darcy (Bracken in a dual role), a purveyor of supposedly cursed curios, shows up unannounced to Ted’s home, which he now shares with his new girlfriend Yana (Caroline Menton). She has also had a trunk sent to the house, which contains a deliciously creepy wooden figure guaranteed to provide shivers to fear-fare fanatics new and old. Darcy has her suspicions about Dani’s death, and with the golem-like figure in tow, she aims to find answers.
McCarthy conjured up a dread-drenched atmosphere in his previous feature Caveat (2020) — those who watched that film will spot the stuffed bunny animal on display in Darcy’s shop — and he manages to build an even more eldritch ambience with Oddity. The cast is stellar, the mysteries and weaves are many — and they all pay off well — Colm Hogan’s cinematography is splendid, and Richard G. Mitchell’s evocative score fits the proceedings perfectly.
With Oddity, McCarthy takes elements from classic horror, from the style of earlier fright fare mentioned above to the revenge tales so beloved in EC horror comics and beyond, and fashions them into something that feels comfortably — or perhaps that should read uncomfortably — familiar yet refreshingly original. With this film and Caveat, he has already made a strong case for himself for being one of the strongest current voices in horror cinema. Oddity is a lock for my top five scare-fare films of 2024, and I highly recommend it for aficionados of the wonderfully weird.
Oddity screened as part of South Korea’s Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BIFAN), which took place July 4–14, 2024. For more info, visit the fest’s official website at https://www.bifan.kr/eng/.
IFC Films will release Oddity in theaters July 19, 2024.
