Hokum

Unlikeable Ohm Bauman, portrayed by a great Adam Scott, is in search of peace and quiet to finish his book (and maybe some closure of his own), but what he finds instead is an inn full of secrets both dead and alive. As a lover of haunted houses and hotels, I enjoyed the creepiness of the environment, the deeply unsettling props (what is it with McCarthy and rabbits?), and the overall tasteful jump-scares immensely. The narrative itself, though, does fall a bit flat. The story leans heavily on characters who really weren't given enough screentime to justify the narrative weight they're asked to carry, and the how's and why's of the paranormal stay frustratingly in the background for most of the runtime. I really would've loved a bit more witch in my witch-haunted inn :(

Flawed story aside, Hokum still delivers the kind of creeps I've come to expect and love from McCarthy since Oddity and Caveat, and on that front, it definitely doesn't disappoint.