‘Hokum’ Review – Irish Folklore & Modern Horror Combine For A Nightmare That Truly Lingers

The haunted hotel subgenre of horror isn’t tapped often, but, when done well, can do devishly good things with the space it occupies and with the peculiar people that make up its staff or other visitors. The Shining, 1408, and The Innkeepers have utilized all of this to great effect, and now Damian McCarthy’s Hokum can be added to the list. On his third feature, following 2020’s Caveat and 2024’s Oddity, McCarthy shows an affinity for this subgenre and an immense talent for building scares that matter rather than just cheap parlor tricks. In some ways, the director is working with elements he’s familiar with, as Hokum feels like an extension of sorts of some of the impressive work he did with Oddity in terms of atmosphere and having his protagonist in isolated locations where the mysteries of the dark can lead to stuff of nightmares. That being said, it wouldn’t be fair to suggest that McCarthy is just treading familiar territory with Hokum. The film is also an examination of guilt, grief, and past traumas that is remarkably character-driven while also patiently building up that horror to craft a truly frightening experience.

Ohm Bauman (Adam Scott) is a famous American author who is close to completing his Conquistador Trilogy, but when the audience meets him, his headspace has made him decidedly unlikable. He exhibits depressive traits that are only fueled by his consumption of alcohol. To finish his book, Ohm has decided to leave home for a more isolated location connected to the past of his deceased parents. His travels take him to the location where his parents spent their honeymoon, the Billberry Woods Hotel in Ireland. In addition to finishing his book, Ohm plans to scatter his parents’ ashes in the forest where his mother was photographed during their honeymoon.

Ohm doesn’t make friends easily when he arrives at the Billberry Woods Hotel. His snarky and clearly jaded personality seems at odds with someone who seems to want isolation to finish his work, as he meddles in the business of the people he meets. He’s not exactly pleasant to the desk manager, Mal (Peter Coonan), and he’s even worse to the bellhop Alby (Will O’Connell), someone who has aspirations of writing himself, but Ohm doesn’t believe he’s thick-skinned enough to tap into the places necessary to write something that will resonate. The one person who seems to crack Ohm’s cantankerous mode, at least somewhat, is the bartender Fiona (Florence Ordesh), someone who notices that his irritability is hiding deep-rooted pain. It’s her mysterious disappearance that begins the film’s nightmarish journey and unlocks local legends that Ohm will find himself right in the middle of.

McCarthy is an expert in mood and escalating tension. This begins not only with the picturesque scenery that hides something dark behind its seemingly idyllic facade, but also by plucking an American main character out of familiar surroundings and placing him into a location like a fish out of water, where nothing is familiar to him. The audience, even as Ohm begins the story as someone who isn’t to like, still connects with him on a certain level because he’s learning of these strange legends and experiencing these building frights at the same time they are.

Among the folklore is that told by the owner of the hotel, Mr. Cobb (Brendan Conroy), who believes that there is a witch who chains up children and takes them to places unknown. Adding a bit of connection to Ohm’s past of sorts is that the owner believes that the witch is trapped in the now off-limits Honeymoon Suite, the very same one that Ohm’s parents spent their honeymoon in all those years ago. Ohm feels obligated to find the missing Fiona since she took pity on him and saved him from a suicide attempt, which leads him to team up with a loner named Jerry (David Wilmot), a man who lives in the woods and dabbles in psychedelics to connect himself to forces of the supernatural kind. Not only does this lead to considerably terrifying imagery and situations that escalate as the film heads into its third act, but it also makes for a tantalizing mystery that engages from start to finish.

Much of Hokum’s power lies in McCarthy’s writing and direction. The film is full of literary symbolism that works in large part because the film is not only telling the story of the strange happenings at the hotel, but also Ohm’s psycho as he tries to finish his book in his dimly lit room with a whiskey always nearby. The scenes that bookend the film are the ones in Ohm’s mind that depict his last Conquistador book as he tries to finish its finale. The protagonist of Ohm’s book (portrayed by Austin Amelio) comes right out of the sixteenth century and is on a quest with a young boy for buried treasure. There is a literary connection between Ohm’s work and his relationship with his parents that leads to a gradual breaking down of his walls for the audience. There is a reason that Ohm is so off-putting, something that is learned through his work and as he tries to decipher the mysteries surrounding him.

Ohm’s mental space and heaspace shares equal time with the scares that McCarthy has become an expert at dishing out. The imagery is of the surreal kind and the stuff of nightmares that would only confuse someone more after waking up. The trailer garnered appropriate attention when images of a rabbit-man with crazed eyes popped up before its conclusion, and even though that was teased in the previews, it still manages to elicit unsettling fear as he utters taunting lines that linger within the psyche of the audience.

Then there is the place unknown that the hotel owner believed the witch chained up children who were never seen again. Although the glimpses into this underworld are brief, the imagery is jarring as black figures with spooky eyes and outstretched hands add to the film’s nightmarish world. McCarthy is smart enough to create a visual palette that is hidden enough that most of the terror is fueled by what the audience believes they are seeing. Then there is the witch herself, a character that is never rendered with obvious CGI that would be the case if this were a lesser endeavor. Other spooky plot devices include a broken dumbwaiter, which is disabled just enough to make the audience believe there is no returning from the hotel’s sealed-off basement, and Joseph Bishara’s haunting score, which only adds to the atmospheric chills that lurk in the haunted Honeymoon Suite.

Scott proves to be the right choice to portray Ohm. As an actor, he’s known for portraying very likable people, but he shows no problem showing off Ohm’s less-than-desirable traits as we enter the story. There are long stretches of the film where Ohm is the only character that the film is following, so Scott’s challenge here is setting up Ohm’s unlikability, complete with entitlement and dour sarcasm, but then getting him to a place where redemption can be possible. There are layers to Ohm that reveal themselves as the film progresses, and Scott tackles all of them with ease, leading to one of his best performances as someone who is truly a complicated man.

Hokum works because it’s not just one thing. It’s a haunted hotel movie, a mystery, and folklore horror while also not being a tired variation of those familiar elements by adding well-grounded character work that tackles something profoundly human. Ohm’s journey proves to be just as important as the horror surrounding him and makes for a film that offers up more surprises than expected. Hokum is thoughtful in how it presents its scares and even more thoughtful of the human elements that only enhance the things that we hear that go bump in the night.

Hokum opens in theaters this Friday nationwide courtesy of Neon.