Vertigo ReleasingIf you’re sick of jingling bells and Christmas films already, there’s a new horror making waves online: The Hole In The Ground is on Netflix now.
For genre aficionados, the Irish supernatural horror has been kicking around since its debut at the Sundance Film Festival in January this year (it was then screened at Glasgow Film Festival before a limited UK and Irish release in March).
However, Netflix have picked it up for streaming, enabling a much wider audience to be sunk into its eerie hole.
Check out the trailer for The Hole In The Ground below:
It’s the debut feature film from Lee Cronin, a writer and director from Dublin – he’s well-established in the short film world, with Ghost Train winning the Méliès d’Argent for Best European Fantastic Short film in 2013.
Teaming up with Stephen Shields on the script, the synopsis for the film reads:
A young mother living in the Irish countryside with her son suspects his increasingly disturbing behavior is linked to a mysterious sinkhole in the forest, and fears he may not be her son at all.
Starring Seána Kerslake and James Quinn Markey as the mother and son respectively, the film is sitting at 85% Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, with the consensus writing: ‘The Hole In The Ground artfully exploits parental fears with a well-made horror outing that makes up in sheer effectiveness what it lacks in originality.’
Vertigo ReleasingThe Twitter-sphere is flocking to see what the fuss is all about, as users continue to share their enthused thoughts on the movie. A fan called it ‘one of scariest horror films of 2019 – from its freakish audio and chilling visuals to the wonderful and beguiling Seána Kerslake and her outstanding co-star James Quinn’.
Another user wrote: ‘Highly recommend [Lee Cronin’s] fantastic The Hole In The Ground, which landed on Netflix today! One of my favourite film-makers and the best cinema experience I’ve had this year.’
Vertigo ReleasingA24 are distributing the film overseas – the prolific studio behind petrifying efforts like The Witch, Hereditary and this year’s unbelievably good Midsommar.
Critics have similarly praised the Irish horror. The Evening Standard‘s Charlotte O’Sullivan wrote: ‘Sarah and her sort-of boy prove hard to shake off. Don’t be surprised if weeks after you see this they grope their way into your dreams.’
The Hole In The Ground is available to watch on Netflix now.
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After graduating from Glasgow Caledonian University with an NCTJ and BCTJ-accredited Multimedia Journalism degree, Cameron ventured into the world of print journalism at The National, while also working as a freelance film journalist on the side, becoming an accredited Rotten Tomatoes critic in the process. He’s now left his Scottish homelands and took up residence at UNILAD as a journalist.