There are regularly films to discover in the Berlinale program that are otherwise more likely to be found in the genre diversity of the Fantasy Film Festival. This year’s festival in Berlin has something between sophisticated dramas and ponderous arthouse chunks wonderfully twisted horror insider tip Cuckoo grabbed.
He doesn’t just score points with Euphoria and The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes star Hunter Schafer. Above all, two genre legends as obvious role models make Tilman Singer’s Berlinale entry an idiosyncratic trip into the monstrous shallows of the Bavarian Alps.
Insider tip Cuckoo unfolds as a horror puzzle with a lot of eerie tension
Singer’s film begins with a family trip, which has an ominous atmosphere from the first scenes. 17-year-old Gretchen (Schafer) arrives at the Alp Schatten holiday resort with her father (Marton Csokas), her stepmother (Jessica Henwick) and her sister (Mila Lieu) Alma. Here the parents want to design new accommodation in the holiday resort together with the resort manager Mr. König (Dan Stevens).
Cuckoo holds back longer with concrete horror and only scatters hints and puzzle pieces of horror, from which it is initially difficult to put together a picture. Gretchen and her family don’t just bring unresolved trauma with them to the Bavarian holiday resort. The idyllic Alpine panorama also seems increasingly eerie as the wind whistles through the trees and constantly blows Sound reverberates as an echo, clawing its way into your head like a female, animal scream.
And then there is the creepy resort manager Mr. King, who Dan Stevens plays way too over-friendly. The way he constantly deliberately pronounces the American version of Gretchen’s name with the German sound is irritating. He didn’t even pick up his flute, but you should see for yourself.
Tilman Singer passionately layers horror elements on top of each other for his second feature film after his promising final project at the Cologne Media Art Academy. After the atmospheric genre exercise Luz, which ran for a crisp 70 minutes, Cuckoo is the much more ambitious project, realized with visibly higher production values. Similar to its predecessor, Singer’s obvious directing influences shine through in his second work.
Genre masters Dario Argento and David Cronenberg send their regards in the Berlinale film Cuckoo
Of course, Cuckoo’s many twists, which give the film a pleasant unpredictability, are not revealed here. But when Singer later lets bizarre body horror break out, memories of the monstrous deformations and tragic excesses from David Cronenberg’s cinema are quickly awakened. One film in particular by the Canadian genre master from 1979 seems like a clear model for Cuckoo, but it won’t be revealed here for spoiler reasons.
The atmosphere of Singer’s second film is shaped even more strongly by the style of the Italian giallo and horror director Dario Argento. Anyone who has ever seen one of his films such as Suspiria or Profondo Rosso will remember them inimitable mix of artistic horror images and think actions that have been removed from all logic and reality.
Argento’s Phenomena in particular seems like a relative of Cuckoo. In the 1985 film, Jennifer Connelly is a young girl who finds herself at a boarding school in the Swiss Alps, where a serial killer is on the loose. Add to this premise supernatural abilities, a cranky entomologist and a scalpel-wielding monkey!
You can watch the Phenomena trailer here:
Phenomena Movie – Trailer
Things don’t get quite as crazy in Cuckoo, but Singer has them sometimes crooked dialogues and increasingly hair-raising escalating plot twists from Argento’s work also in his luggage. If the director plays with his cards a little too open towards the end, drags out the showdown and wants to combine the bizarre with the emotional, Cuckoo becomes a bit too overloaded and frays in comparison to the very dense Luz.
Hunter Schafer, who wields her butterfly knife with stubborn resistance, still holds the film together as the most casual Final Girl in a long time. And the next time you hear a cuckoo calling from the forest, it won’t be in the same way you’re used to.
Cuckoo is running as a special gala at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival. The film premiered at Verti Music Hall on Friday, February 16, 2024. It will start in German cinemas on July 18, 2024.