Reviews
‘Nightwatch’ Review: A Flawed Mess With A Stacked Cast
As someone who works the night shift and is a fan of the Lucy Dacus song, I can confirm that weird stuff goes on during the graveyard hours. When most people are asleep, it’s easy to get more freaked out by the things that go bump in the night, to wonder what lurks beyond the streetlight. We’ve been seeing a lot more workplace horror set at night over the past few years. Malum was a great reimagining of Last Shift, and recently, Shudder released both Bodycam and Night Patrol. Danish filmmaker Ole Bornedal’s Nightwatch is a highly regarded film that has somehow slipped under my radar. So, you’re probably assuming that this review is about 1994’s Nightwatch, right? Wrong! For some reason, I decided to watch 1997’s Nightwatch, the English remake, starring Ewan McGregor.
Nightwatch: A Morgue, Murders, and a Prime Suspect
Martin Bells (Ewan McGregor) is in the home stretch for his law degree. Presumably, to pay off the looming student loans, he takes a job as a night watchman at a morgue. A string of murders threatening local sex workers starts filling up Martin’s morgue, left and right. The seemingly unassuming Martin’s world is turned upside down when Inspector Cray (Nick Nolte) and Deputy Inspector Bill Davis (John C. Reilly) turn their sights on him as a potential suspect in these sex worker slayings.
In Michael Haneke fashion, Ole Bornedal reclaims the director’s chair for the English-language remake of his film, with a script penned by himself and Steven Soderbergh. Adding another cherry on top of the cake is that Nightwatch is edited by none other than Sally Menke. Though it might be best if we don’t discuss who the producers were. Bornedal’s remake is an unusual beast. As stated, I have not seen the original, but for a film as lauded as it is, I can’t imagine it’s anything like this.
Pacing Problems and a Directionless Script
Nightwatch is painfully slow and spends a majority of its runtime meandering around. It can’t decide what it wants to be. Bornedal and Soderbergh’s script is all over the place. At times, it is frustratingly vague, and at other points, it beats you over the head with exposition. Nothing is more frustrating than when a character lays out their emotions or actions beat-for-beat. The dialogue is unbelievably forced and fails to have any single bit of impact. Moreover, we continually ping pong between settings in a way that ruins the pacing. Not even the utterly talented Sally Menke could have saved this film with editing.
When I started Nightwatch, I completely missed that Soderbergh had a hand in the script. Soderbergh is one of those writers who is better as a director. This script is messy, flawed, and at times, boring. The only aspect of this film that truly works is the incredible performances of Nick Nolte and Josh Brolin. I have no clue what the hell Ewan McGregor is doing throughout this, but Nolte and Brolin (as well as Patricia Arquette) make this film palatable. Brolin plays a uniquely weird asshole whose character motivations make little to no sense, but I’ll be damned if I don’t eat it up every time Brolin chews up a film’s scenery like a leathery steak. And I haven’t seen many films with Nick Nolte, and I think I need to change that because he’s a total blast to watch on screen.
Tonal Misfires and Bizarre Creative Choices
Nightwatch takes some questionable, semen-filled turns that feel so out of place you might think it’s a dark comedy. McGregor’s blank stares feel intentionally empty. Which is an odd direction for this character to make, as we’re supposed to believe he’s nearing completion of law school. If this weird dork were my lawyer, I would immediately request a new one. The fact that this soon-to-be lawyer can’t put these pieces together until it’s clearly spelled out is beyond alarming.
Nightwatch Is a Forgettable Remake Better Left in the Dark
All in all, Nighwatch just left me questioning what I witnessed. I didn’t hate it, but I definitely didn’t like it. By the time the credits rolled, the movie left my head and existed in the recesses of my brain as a mildly interesting nightmare does hours later. I’m really not sure who thought this remake was a good idea. Well, I think I do, but he’s rotting away on Rikers Island. I can confidently say, even without seeing it, that the original Nightwatch is better, so maybe just watch that one instead.
Haunted house stories are a staple in the horror genre. But it’s not often that a haunted house film digs its way under your skin and stays there long after the credits roll. Enter Recluse, celebrating its world premiere at the 2026 Tribeca Film Festival.
A Disturbing Return Home Fuels Recluse’s Story
Joan Wyatt, a young and troubled audio engineer, is called back to her childhood home following a bizarre accident in which her father, the famous artist Lawrence Wyatt, was engulfed in flames and left in critical condition. Joan has been estranged from her father for quite some time, so when his longtime housekeeper Lydia leaves a voicemail telling her that he likely doesn’t have a lot of time left, she ignores it. But then Lawrence himself calls, telling Joan that he’s been seeing her mother—who disappeared when Joan was a child—around the house.
Joan arrives to find Lydia armed with a crossbow to ward off Lawrence’s obsessive fans. Her father is bed-bound with severe burns, and is being cared for by a hired nurse around Joan’s age named Emily. Lawrence, who notoriously experimented with psychedelics and occult practices during his career, is barely coherent and keeps his face concealed underneath a crude plaster mask. He keeps asking about his “little spider.” It’s disturbing and deeply upsetting, especially since Joan already has a lifetime of trauma associated with the house. Now that she’s back, she begins to suspect that these “ghosts” aren’t metaphorical. Lawrence was not a good man… but something even more sinister may be lurking in the house.
Henry Chaisson Reinvents the Haunted House Formula
Recluse, written and directed by Henry Chaisson, is a masterfully crafted debut feature that takes familiar elements of the haunted house genre—like a remote mansion as the setting, traumatic family secrets, and supernatural mischief—and twists them into something fresh and, well, twisted.
Sasha Frolova Leads an Exceptional Ensemble Cast
Sasha Frolova stars as Joan, delivering a performance that is both believable and compelling. She’s easy to root for throughout the film, especially as she contends with her father’s unwaveringly loyal housekeeper Lydia, brilliantly played by Toby Poser. Mia Vallet’s portrayal of Emily is also noteworthy, commanding attention from her first appearance all the way to the end. Kimball Farley plays Lydia’s son and Joan’s friend Todd with the perfect balance of levity and tension. Frankie Seratch is enjoyable to watch as the opportunistic nepo baby art dealer Tom. Rounding out the cast is Xander Berkeley as Lawrence; even from behind a mask, his performance is intense and chilling. Berkeley even provided some of his own art to be used in the film.
Sound Design and Cinematography Create Unrelenting Terror
The cast is far from the film’s only strength, though. Sound design by Matthew Rollins will have you death-gripping your seat in the best way, and serves as an integral part of the story itself. Production designer Yulanda Yo-Rong Shieh and art director Ana María Kalvo absolutely nailed the set and made the Wyatt family mansion simultaneously sprawling and claustrophobic.
Finally, we have the beautiful and (appropriately) haunting cinematography by Bryce Holden, supported by the editing prowess of Nik Voytas, Josh Lobo, and Henry Chaisson. Not only did they maintain an air of unrelenting suspense throughout the entire film, but they also executed some of the most disturbing and bone-chilling jump scares I’ve seen in recent years.
Seriously: One of those jump scares made me feel physically ill. You’ll know it when you see it for yourself.
Recluse had its world premiere at Tribeca Film Festival 2026.
One of my favorite special interests is the Mormon-millionaire-real-estate-tycoon-owned Skinwalker Ranch. Mormon millionaire Brandon Fugal has crafted a wonderfully apophenic history in his post-Bigelow ownership. His perfectly curated release of pseudo-information through the lens of a History Channel TV show did wonders not just for his wallet but for docu-dramas as a whole. Fugal did what The Curse of Oak Island could have only wished to accomplish. BUT, three years before Joseph Smith’s teachings made their way to the Uinta Basin, a group of filmmakers set out to capitalize on one of America’s strangest phenomena. Skinwalker Ranch is a film that is as perplexing as it is insufferable.
Skinwalker Ranch: Missing Children, UFOs, and Found Footage Chaos
In 2010, Hoyt’s (Jon Gries) son disappeared in a blinding ball of light. Some time later, Modern Defense Enterprises sent a team of experts to Hoyt’s property to study what happened to Cody (Nash Lucas). Upon arriving at the property, MDE sets up a reality-TV-like number of security cameras in the hopes of finding anything. But what they found may just make them wish they hadn’t set foot on this property.
The Real History Behind Skinwalker Ranch Lore
As stated, the story of and behind Skinwalker Ranch is one of my favorite bits of Americana. From the Sherman family’s story, through Robert Bigelow’s ownership, all the way to its current Mormon occupation, the history behind Skinwalker Ranch runs deep. Dire wolves, dino beavers, and disappearing orbs, oh my! Whether you believe in the stories or not, Skinwalker Ranch is one of America’s biggest pieces of lore.
One of my favorite theories is that a resource-observing beacon was placed by, for lack of a better term, aliens when Pangea existed. Throughout the years, the dissolution of Pangea shifted the location of where the aliens placed the beacon to what is now considered the Mesa on the northern portion of Skinwalker Ranch’s property. The said beacon could very possibly be what causes the mysterious 1.6 GHz signal on the ranch, or why there are so many UAP sightings around the Mesa.
How Skinwalker Ranch Wastes Its Fascinating Premise
Now, I know all of this has been discovered post-Skinwalker Ranch (movie), but Hunt for the Skinwalker and Skinwalkers at the Pentagon, by Colm Kelleher and George Knapp (and James T. Lacatski for Pentagon), had already been released. Dino beavers on Skinwalker Ranch had already been discussed. The true terror of Skinwalker Ranch had been disseminated by three highly regarded UFOlogists. So, for writer Adam Ohler (and story by Devin McGinn, Steve Berg, Ken Bretschneider, and Murphy Michaels) to craft such a plain story that doesn’t even scratch the surface of what makes Skinwalker Ranch even slightly interesting is confounding. It feels as if the writer/story creators heard the term “Skinwalker Ranch” and decided to focus on that, and that alone. Skinwalker Ranch has zero world-building, and hopes that the title is titillating enough to get someone to click ‘play’.
The singular great aspect about Skinwalker Ranch is the casting of Jon Gries (Uncle Rico in Napoleon Dynamite) and Michael Horse (Deputy Hawk in Twin Peaks). Gries does enough carrying in this film to make up for dropping that winning pass. And it’s just wonderful to see Michael Horse in a film, even if he’s cast as a token Native American whose only purpose is to make the writers feel better for capitalizing on Native American lore. Besides that, the acting in Skinwalker Ranch is beyond atrocious. In fact, the acting feels so unnatural that I honestly thought the team from MDE was going to turn out to be the aliens that kidnapped Cody. Turns out, the story doesn’t even attempt to be 1% as clever as that.
A Massive Found Footage Failure
Skinwalker Ranch not only fails at being an interesting sci-fi horror flick, but it also fails at being a found footage flick. Full of awful CGI, bad acting, and an even worse script, Skinwalker Ranch exists as nothing more than a time waster. In fact, Travis Walton’s experience in Fire in the Sky would be more entertaining to take part in than watching even two minutes of this film–I’d rather get dry probed by the Hyperboreans than ever think of this movie again.
