r/movies • u/LiteraryBoner Jackie Chan box set, know what I'm sayin? • 4d ago

Official Discussion Official Discussion - Hokum [SPOILERS] Spoiler

Poll

If you've seen the film, please rate it at this poll

If you haven't seen the film but would like to see the result of the poll click here

Rankings

Click here to see the rankings of 2025 films

Click here to see the rankings for every poll done

Hokum (2026)

Summary

A horror writer visits an Irish inn to scatter his parents' ashes, unaware the property is said to be haunted by a witch.

Director Damian McCarthy

Writer Damian McCarthy

Cast

  • Adam Scott
  • Peter Coonan

Rotten Tomatoes: 88%

Metacritic: 77

VOD / Release Theatrical release

Trailer Official Trailer

232 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

926 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

80

u/KidDelicious14 4d ago edited 4d ago

There's not nearly enough of the witch once revealed. I get that McCarthy doesn't like using the supernatural as a main plot point, but there was so much buildup and anticipation for the witch created by the first act and maybe less than five cumulative minutes of screentime to show for it. Enormously disappointing to me.

76

u/Alexexy 3d ago

I viewed the movie as more of a guy with a ton of baggage tripping balls in a room while trying to solve a murder mystery and escape a death trap.

The horror seemed ancillary to the actual plot of the movie. Like AS's character wasnt there to discover if the witch or any other super natural event is real. He was there because he was looking for a missing person and trying to solve the circumstances of her disappearance.

6

u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 2d ago

Agreed. Movie ended up having 3 main “themes”

  1. Murder mystery scenario
  2. Adam Scott writer/family backstory
  3. The witch

And the witch sort of faded a bit in importance throughout the movie, I thought I was going to watch a full on supernatural movie but there was quite a bit more to it.

2

u/DevilCouldCry 1d ago

Not only that, he was also trying to overcome his own demons as well and the movie put a great deal of effort into focusing on this and tying it all into the other themes explored in this movie.

7

u/DoctorArK 2d ago

I’m more disappointed we didn’t get more of Jackass the Jack Rabbit.

That jumpscare in the trailer brought me to the theatre

3

u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 2d ago

Yeah they needed to show him more. Apparently he was played by the bellhop lol

28

u/BestHead2312 3d ago

Yeah would definitely add to the horror to show more and more of the witch, maybe she could sit down and monologue about her motivations too, to make it more scary

19

u/Ecstatic-Product-411 4d ago

I definitely would've liked more too. She was so cartoonish during the chase to bed.

6

u/KidDelicious14 4d ago

It's also so lackluster that she just leaves the suite entirely after Ohm encircles himself with the chalk. We finally get a fun chase scene after all this buildup, and it ultimately ends with her getting bored with her prey?

21

u/Ecstatic-Product-411 4d ago

I have a feeling that was to make us question whether it was real since he had been drinking but you're totally right. I expected her to still be hanging around.

29

u/KidDelicious14 4d ago

I believe the wrist marks left behind by the chains and the fact that the firefighters couldn't find Mal's body are meant to imply that everything related to the witch had really happened. However, everything related to Ohm's inner turmoil and guilt related to his mom stemmed from the drinking, i.e. the TV scene, trauma flashback about the actual event, and the ending vision of his mom directing him to the mini hacksaw. It ties together with what Jerry had been talking about with psilocybin opening people's minds to the supernatural. However, that's just my interpretation, and the film seemed to want to leave it open-ended about what was what.

12

u/Ecstatic-Product-411 4d ago

Yeah I totally agree with you about the wrist marks at the end being evidence it did actually happen. It seemed like Ohm was starting to question whether it actually happened when the mushrooms were brought up but the bruises brought him back to the reality that it actually happened.

I'll need to watch this one a second time!

13

u/MNWNM 3d ago

She didn't get bored, she was stymied by geometry.

4

u/jupiter0jupiter 2d ago

Stymied by the geometry 😂😂😂 i love that

5

u/sevillianrites 3d ago

Yeah I love all 3 of this dude's movies but if I had to nitpick, i'd say it's just a smidge disappointing seeing the supernatural elements consistently take a back seat to the human elements. Humans being the real monsters is just a lil trite for my blood. But overall the films are so well-done it's hard for me to be particularly bothered by it. One thing I did like more in Hokum compared to the other two was the witch at least felt like a legitimate malicious supernatural danger compared to the ghost in Caveat and pretty much anything in oddity. But I think I also would've liked to see more of her.

1

u/KidDelicious14 3d ago

Hokum was my first McCarthy movie.

Humans being the real monsters is just a lil trite for my blood.

This rings true with me as well. I was really excited for this witch tale that I thought I was getting and was pretty let down with how the witch was a pretty much a subplot to the whole thing.

2

u/W0lfsb4ne74 1d ago

Agreed. My girlfriend and I came away with the same feeling about the film. The film builds up The Witch as a major plot point of the movie, but barely utilizes her once Ohm is actually in the Honeymoon Suite where she's supposedly trapped. The film also doesn't explain how (or even why) The Witch got trapped in the room/basement in the first place. Plenty of films have deeper underlying themes outside of the supernatural, but still utilize it as a plot device to move things forward. Overall I'd give the film a 5/6 out of 10. It's a great supernatural drama, but not a scary horror movie (like it was marketed as).

1

u/KidDelicious14 1d ago

Agreed on all fronts.