Barbarian Review

Barbarian is a film directed and written by Zach Cregger. It stars Georgina Campbell, Bill Skarsgard and Justin Long. It is a horror film with a 1 hour and 42 minute run time.

According to IMDB, the synopsis of Barbarian is “A woman staying at an Airbnb discovers that the house she has rented is not what it seems.”

Barbarian Review

Going into this film last week, I knew little to nothing about it. I had watched the trailer briefly but essentially went in without really knowing what it might be like. This is probably what I recommend you do as well as this film is an excellent experience if you let yourself be surprised by what is there.

The story is very simple in Barbarian. Essentially what happens is that Tess (Georgina Campbell) goes to stay at an Airbnb she rented. She awkwardly finds it’s double booked with another guest Keith (Bill Skarsgård) and the home itself is a dodgy one. They both stay the night and have a horrific experience there. I won’t go too much into the story because I want you to go there and just enjoy it. I was however pleased with the effort that Zach Cregger took as the writer/director to build up the characters a little and put a bit of a backstory to all the main ones. It’s not common in horror movies to get as much depth to the characters as you do in Barbarian.

The film itself is actually a little scary. There are jump scares, yes. But it’s also very creepy. I felt uneasy after coming out of this screening last week which is a good thing, it’s what I want to feel after seeing a horror movie.

I do have one recommendation for viewers going to see this at their nearest cinema. This movie has a bit of a dark-colour palette to it. Things happen mostly in the dark, similar to I guess The Batman (2022). If you have a choice of cinema to go to, I’d recommend choosing one with a decent screen/projector so you can see things a bit better. It’s only a minor improvement but it will help. If you’re watching this at home, it will look great on Televisions that handle dark colours well.

Special effects are decent, there’s some good use of them in this film. It didn’t feel like a low-budget horror movie. Action elements were also fairly suspenseful and were rewarding when they occurred.

Overall I was pleasantly surprised with Barbarian. I wasn’t expecting much out of this film and was surprised by how well it was put together. It’s a perfect Halloween movie to go and see. It’s scary, it’s creepy and has some decent characters to get to know. I’d happily go see this again and might even add it to my Blu-Ray collection one day. If you’re looking for something scary and need a horror film this week. I’m happy to recommend that you go and see Barbarian.

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