Cuckoo

"Cuckoo is best described as a terrifying feast of extravagance that stumbles over its own ambitions. The plot starts simply: a teenager, Gretchen (Euphoria's Hunter Schafer), must leave her home in the United States after her mother's death to move with her father, her young stepmother, and her half-sister to a resort in the German Alps. There, they are greeted by Herr König (Dan Stevens in an eccentric performance), who seems to be hiding a sinister operation behind his friendly facade. From there, director Tilman Singer aims high and loses a bit of control: there's a tangled plot involving cuckoo birds, motherhood, and the female guests of the resort. However, Singer's direction is highly effective technically, achieving a simply disturbing atmosphere with very well-executed jump scares. Beneath thick layers of somewhat convoluted and clumsily delivered exposition, Cuckoo is a clever—and unsettling—allegory about the imposition of conservative values in their most perverse form. It's a bit confusing, but deserves a chance."