‘Play House’ Review – A New Voice Has Been Discovered In The Lost Media Genre [Fantastic Fest 2026]

I have a soft spot for lost media horror, so the basic setup of Play House immediately had my attention. Elliot, played by Will Harrison, buys a falling-apart house with money left to him by his mother, partly because he wants to prove that he can finally get his life together and partly because he hopes it might convince his ex-girlfriend Cath (Jessica Sula) to give their relationship another chance. While renovating the place with his best friend Alden (Jordan Gonzalez), he finds a collection of VHS tapes hidden in the basement. They contain episodes of an unaired children’s television show called Mr. Morton’s Monster Alley, hosted by the unnerving Mr. Morton, played by James Urbaniak. From there, the house and the tapes become increasingly difficult to separate.

The setup isn’t exactly new. Creepy children’s television, puppets, VHS tapes, and an old house have become familiar ingredients in horror over the last decade, but Nicolas Curcio and Kirby Gladstein find enough personality in the combination to make it interesting. I especially liked that the tapes aren’t immediately presented as some obviously evil artifact. At first, there is something almost funny about Mr. Morton’s Monster Alley. The show has that strange, tragicomic quality that makes you wonder whether you’re supposed to laugh or feel uncomfortable. Mr. Morton is bizarre, the puppets are weird, and there is something slightly off about the whole production without the film immediately telling you why.

James Urbaniak is fantastic. He gives Mr. Morton this strange, uncomfortable presence that becomes more disturbing the longer you watch him. He isn’t constantly screaming or doing something obviously sinister. There is something about the way he carries himself and delivers his lines that makes you want to keep watching him, even when you know you probably shouldn’t. Urbaniak is easily the standout of the movie, and the scenes involving Mr. Morton are where Play House comes closest to the horror it is trying to achieve.

Oddly enough, I wouldn’t call Play House particularly scary. I was never terrified watching it, and there aren’t many moments that genuinely made me jump. What it does have is a creepy atmosphere that hangs over the entire movie. The house helps a lot. The production design makes the place feel genuinely neglected, with damaged walls, old fixtures, clutter, and rooms that look like they have been sitting untouched for years. Curcio doesn’t need to make every corner pitch black to convince you something is wrong. There is enough natural decay in the environment already.

The visual style also gives the movie a slightly Gothic quality that works surprisingly well against the Southern California setting. The house feels almost like it belongs in another time, which makes the dated VHS footage fit naturally into the world. Watching Elliot and Alden sit in front of an old CRT television and go through these strange tapes is probably the part of the movie I enjoyed the most. There is something inherently fun about discovering something that was never supposed to be seen.

That sense of discovery is important because Elliot’s curiosity gives the story its momentum. Harrison gives him a believable vulnerability as someone still dealing with his mother’s death and the collapse of his relationship with Cath. Buying the house is supposed to be proof that he can take responsibility for his life, but the more he becomes obsessed with the tapes, the more that goal starts slipping away. Cath isn’t simply there as a romantic interest either. Their attempts to reconnect give Elliot another reason to keep trying to hold his life together while everything around him becomes stranger.

The relationship material isn’t always as compelling as the horror, though. There are stretches where Play House gets bogged down in Elliot’s personal problems without adding much to either the mystery or his character. The film is fairly short, yet it still manages to meander. Some scenes feel like they are waiting for the next important thing to happen rather than actually developing the story. Considering how strong the central idea is, I wanted the movie to move with a little more confidence once the tapes were discovered.

That also applies to the mystery itself. The beginning makes you curious about who Mr. Morton is, what happened to the show, why the tapes were hidden, and what connection they have to the house. Curcio wisely keeps the answers back for a while. The problem is that the progression from finding the tapes to the eventual supernatural horror isn’t always as smooth as it could be. There are pieces that work individually, but the movie occasionally feels like it is jumping between ideas rather than building toward them.

Still, I appreciated how many different tones Curcio is trying to balance. Play House has elements of analog horror, supernatural horror, comedy, tragedy, and a character drama about grief and growing up. Most of the time, those pieces coexist surprisingly well. The humor in the children’s show makes the darker material more uncomfortable because you’re never entirely sure what you’re watching. Unfortunately, there are a few points where the tonal shifts feel awkward, as though the movie hasn’t quite decided how seriously it wants to take itself.

That is probably the biggest indication that this is a first feature. There are a lot of rough edges, but there is also a clear filmmaker behind them. Curcio isn’t making the safest possible version of this story. He is interested in the weirdness of the tapes, the sadness underneath the horror, and the way Elliot’s obsession starts interfering with his relationships. Even when the execution isn’t completely there, you can see the filmmaker he could become.

The supernatural elements eventually become much more prominent, and this is where I think Play House comes closest to being great without quite getting there. The concept is strong enough to sustain a genuinely unsettling movie, and Mr. Morton is such an effective character that I wanted the film to push him even further. Instead, the story sometimes settles for more familiar horror beats after spending so much time establishing something more distinctive.

There is also a nice connection between the house and Elliot’s emotional state. He buys a place that needs to be completely rebuilt because he wants to convince himself that he is capable of becoming an adult. Meanwhile, the deeper he gets into the house’s history, the more his own life begins falling apart again. His grief, his relationship with Cath, and his friendship with Alden all become tangled up with this bizarre piece of lost media he can’t stop investigating. It gives the horror a reason to exist beyond simply putting characters in a creepy house.

I just wish Play House had been a little tighter. There are too many stretches where the movie circles around its ideas instead of pushing them forward, especially considering how much potential is sitting inside those VHS tapes. But when it clicks, it really clicks. The production design is excellent, the old television footage has an appropriately strange quality, and Urbaniak’s performance gives the movie a genuinely memorable figure at its center.

Play House feels like the work of a filmmaker who hasn’t completely figured everything out yet, but has already found a few things worth paying attention to. It isn’t consistently frightening, and its rougher transitions and pacing keep it from reaching the level its premise suggests. Still, there is enough atmosphere, personality, and genuine weirdness here to make me curious about what Nicolas Curcio does next. For a first film, that is probably the most encouraging thing I can say about it. 

Play House had its World Premiere at Fantastic Fest 2026.

Director: Nicolas Jon Curcio

Writer: Nicolas Jon Curcio, Kirby Gladstein

Rated: NR

Runtime: 85m

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