The Name Says It All

'Cuckoo' is weird. But is it good?

Cuckoo, the sophomore film from writer/director Tilman Singer, is like Rosemary’s Baby meets Alien meets Possession meets The Human Centipede meets any horror movie where someone is in mourning meets The Watchers meets Source Code meets the Chicken Lady from The Kids in the Hall. If that sounds like a heckuva Jenga tower to try and keep upright, that’s because it is. I’ve seen a lot of critics say that this movie has no plot and that it emphasizes atmospherics over story. I don’t think either of those things is true; the problem with Cuckoo is that it has too much plot and, perhaps more damagingly, too many themes. I think there are strong elements in the film, but the sum of the parts is greater than the whole.

Cuckoo stars Hunter Schafer as Gretchen, a 17-year-old girl whose mother has recently died. Consequently, she is now living with her father, Luis (Márton Csókás, who I believe is legally prohibited from playing any character that isn’t villainous); his much younger second wife, Beth (Jessica Henwick); and their half-mute daughter, Alma (Mila Lieu), who she asserts “is not my sister.” As the film opens, they’re moving to this kind of resort/estate place in the Bavarian Alps. The place is overseen by the oddball, vaguely sinister Herr König (Dan Stevens, doing his second wacky accent this year), who Gretchen immediately clocks as being not quite what he seems. And since Cuckoo is (technically) a horror movie, it doesn’t take long for weird and often creepy shit to transpire.

And I do mean weird shit. If you were to read a Wikipedia-style plot summary of several paragraphs before you saw the movie, you’d be equally amused and bumfuzzled. I mean that as a compliment. No one can accuse Singer of watering down his vision for the masses. But save for one beat near the end, I’d argue it’s always clear what’s going on; Cuckoo is not as open to interpretation as I Saw the TV Glow or Longlegs. It’s much closer to Jordan Peele’s Us, where things are arguably over-explained.

Something else that’s great about Cuckoo: Schafer. My only previous experience with the Euphoria star was her extremely brief role in Kinds of Kindness; clearly, she has chops. There’s a protracted shot where she’s trying not to cry in front of her father that made me wanna stand up and applaud. I am now officially a fan.

Less awesome is the underutilization of Henwick, who is coming off of back-to-back killer performances in Glass Onion and The Royal Hotel. I don’t even really get why she’s wanna play this part. Was it more substantial in Singer’s original screenplay? Did she desperately need a paycheck? Was she doing someone a favor? This is a very one-note role that isn’t worthy of her talent.

But where Cuckoo really falters is in its story (which, I remind you for bajillionth time, is different from the plot): Cuckoo is about overcoming loss AND feeling alienated (with a particular emphasis on being queer) AND what it means to be family AND how environmental preservationists are evil (I’m kidding about that last part of, kind of). A movie can have multiple themes, of course, but it’s a challenge, and in this case, it’s a challenge Cuckoo can’t quite meet. Singer’s ambition ultimately exceeds his skill. That may be an admirable problem, but it is a problem.