Damian McCarthy’s third feature film refines the Irish writer-director’s horror style into something sharp and terrifying.
Jump scares often get a bad rap. It is true that they can be a lazy device—a crutch for directors who lack the skill to build tension through more ambitious structural means. But when paired with solid filmmaking, a good jump scare can transform a movie—one that might otherwise be merely good—into a dizzying, thrilling experience that leaves us gasping in awe; and that is exactly what Irish writer-director Damian McCarthy achieves with *Hokum*.
Director: Damian Mc Carthy
Writer: Damian Mc Carthy
Stars: Adam Scott, Peter Coonan, David Wilmot
McCarthy’s previous film, *Oddity* (2024), featured the most terrifying scene of that year: a sequence involving a flashlight, a tent, and a thunderous bang on the door of an isolated farmhouse in the dead of night. And while it is barely March, *Hokum* is almost certainly already shaping up to be a strong contender for that very same title in 2026. *Hokum*’s central scare doesn’t stray far from the formula employed in *Oddity*: it, too, unfolds in an enclosed space, in the dark, with something inexplicable and terrifying suddenly emerging from the shadows. Yet the editing, sound design, production design, and cinematography of this sequence are executed with such mastery that they manage—once again—to shock and mesmerize the viewer.
This is McCarthy’s third feature film, and to date, each of his movies has surpassed the last. All three are supernatural moral fables, featuring themes such as guilt and punishment (typical of Irish Catholicism), an interest in folklore, and an obsession with sinister dolls. *Hokum* is set on Halloween, in a haunted hotel situated in the Irish countryside—a place charged with an unsettling atmosphere and surrounded by goats that attack guests' cars while the guests themselves are under the influence of hallucinogenic mushrooms. As a setting, it feels simultaneously deeply bizarre and intuitively apt: an evocative location for this 21st-century fairy tale, in the style of McCarthy.
Moreover, each of McCarthy’s films increases in scale, and *Hokum* marks his first collaboration with a Hollywood actor. Adam Scott leads the cast in the role of Ohm Bauman, a bitter, alcoholic novelist who travels to the Billberry Woods Hotel to procrastinate and avoid finishing the final volume of his popular "Conqueror Trilogy." (It is a motivation that is easy to identify with—at least for any writers in the audience). He is also there to scatter the ashes of his parents, who passed away when he was very young.
However, his tragic past serves as no excuse for the boorish way Ohm treats Alby (Will O’Connell), the hotel bellhop; and given that this is a Damian McCarthy film, it is a safe bet that, sooner or later, he will get his comeuppance. Accustomed as we are to seeing him play "nice guys," it is amusing to watch Scott embody a detestable jerk—a role he plays with an unflinching, devastating candor. A dark and dramatic event occurring early in the film renders Ohm a slightly more sympathetic figure, leading him back to the hotel in search of a waitress named Fiona (Florence Ordesh)—the very woman who had recounted to him the chilling legend of the witch supposedly haunting the establishment’s bridal suite.
Upon his arrival, Ohm is informed that Fiona has vanished and that no one has seen her since the night of the hotel’s Halloween party. An eccentric local (David Wilmot) suspects foul play and assures Ohm that he knows she is dead, having spotted her ghost in the hotel lobby just a few nights earlier. Ohm, naturally, remains skeptical. Yet, owing Fiona a favor, he breaks into the bridal suite to search for her. He soon finds himself trapped within that musty space, utterly alone—at least until the nightmarish rabbits and black-eyed specters, gliding with frenetic movements, make their appearance as night falls.
It is here that *Hokum* truly reaches its crescendo. The layout of the suite has been designed with meticulous deliberation, imbuing the horror sequences with the distinct feel of a video game—or perhaps an immersive experience—that invites the viewer to interact with objects and explore the various spaces. The most oppressive of these locales is a dumbwaiter that, ostensibly, leads nowhere.
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