Cobweb
Directed by Samuel Bodin
Written by Chris Thomas Devlin
Starring Lizzy Caplan, Antony Starr, Woody Norman
Rated R
Runtime: 1 hour, 28 minutes
In Select Theaters July 21

by Charlie Brigden, Staff Writer

Who knows what you have in your closet or maybe your crawlspace? It's normal to hear strange noises at night, and it's normal to get up and investigate what they are. But surely that tapping didn't come from the wall. Did it?

Cobweb centers on Peter (Norman), an isolated child with strict parents and no friends in a small American town. Peter is regularly bullied at school, but worse for him, is also continually woken in the middle of the night by noises coming from inside his bedroom wall. His strict parents - Carol (Caplan) and Mark (Starr) - think he's imagining things, and while Peter is scared at first, that falls to the wayside when he begins to hear the voice of a young girl. She comforts Peter and sympathises with his difficult life, encouraging him to fight back against the bully.

Unfortunately, this ends with Peter being expelled after pushing him down a flight of stairs, and as his punishment, his parents decide to lock him in the basement, something that they take to with such aplomb that you wonder if it's their first time. Peter wonders the same when he finds a grate and chain in the basement floor that leads to a metal box. Convinced he's either going to spend the rest of his life in the box or worse, he tries to speak to his teacher (Cleopatra Coleman) who has taken an interest in his situation after some particularly terrifying art he painted at school. But will she be able to get past his super weird parents? And was there something living in that box previously?

Cobweb is an absolute thrill ride of a film. It has some genuinely scary moments along with a wonderfully doom-laden atmosphere that you imbibe right from the beginning, but it also grabs you as a drama that does very well to disguise its intent until it's ready to ramp up several gears and deliver some literal hair-raising moments. It does its best not to signpost you either and throws some fine red herrings for your brain to hook and think about so you're not primed for the narrative turns that follow.

One of the reasons Cobweb draws you in so well is its fantastic cast, led by Norman, who was previously lauded for his role opposite Joaquin Phoenix in C'mon C'mon. He is the heart of this film and is wonderfully innocent and shell-shocked, from both having to live with his parents and being constantly bullied. He also has the most amazing scared face and he just looks aghast every time something creepy happens, which emphasises the effect all of this is having on this little boy.

Caplan and Starr are fiercely weird, with both of them almost entranced, like cult members. There are moments when Caplan takes the lead, and others where she's almost breaking out of the trance and realising what she's doing, with Starr there to reassure her that they're doing the right thing. Starr is used to playing an absolute psychopath on TV in his role as Homelander in The Boys, and he does that effortlessly here as well, presenting as someone who is just ready to go off the rails at any moment against anyone. Coleman is excellent as Peter's teacher, and as a black character that shows up at a terminally white home to make sure Peter is okay, there's a wonderful undercurrent that doesn't need to be underlined.

The film is shot by French cinematographer Philip Lozano in a somewhat muted palette, with, as always it seems, the story set shortly before Halloween. As such, the color and even framing of the scenes at the school are reminiscent of Dean Cundey's work on Halloween - whether or not this was an influence is unknown (but it is Halloween, for god's sake). However, Lozano's photography is excellent and gives the film a melancholy mood appropriate for its storyline.

Also terrific is the score by Italian composer Drum and Lace, which affords the picture an eerie undercurrent of dread while also providing emotionally satisfying material for Peter. But what excels is the incessantly creepy childish vocal motif created for Cobweb*. It's both terrifying and beautiful and is very much in the realm of Krzysztof Komeda's haunting music for Rosemary's Baby and the gorgeous main theme from Ennio Morricone's Exorcist II: The Heretic, which Quentin Tarantino reused effectively in The Hateful Eight.

I've tried not to talk about Cobweb itself, but it's a fascinating creature that helps turn the final act into a horrifying monster movie. Without spoiling too much, Cobweb has a sizeable part in the film which could have been overdone but thankfully wasn't. The only real negative point was when they showed a close-up of the face - it felt like it was too much of a show, and that's often the case. You put a monster in, you want people to see it.

Cobweb weaves an engrossing emotional story that it uses to catch the audience unaware, at which point the bottom drops out of the elevator. With a haunting story, strong lead performances, and a dynamite musical score, Cobweb will make you think twice the next time you hear a strange noise in the night.

*To avoid spoilers, the film's creature has been named Cobweb solely for the purpose of this review