As numerous mainstream outlets have very recently declared, folk horror is definitely having a moment. On October 29, 2021, both No Film School and The New York Times described a folk horror “renaissance.” Tellingly, both of these articles center two newly-released high-art / international films—Scott Cooper’s Antlers (produced by Guillermo del Toro) and Valdimar Jóhannsson’s Lamb, the latest horror installment from A24. Both films promise to be, dare I say it, “elevated folk horror,” and, indeed, both articles mention—as recent examples of folk horror—films that have definitely been central to the “elevated horror” movement (e.g., The Witch, Midsommar, The Lighthouse, It Comes at Night, and The Wailing). What these articles fail to mention, though, is folk horror’s recent incursion into films that fall very much on the low end of the prestige spectrum.
Both Mike Nelson’s Wrong Turn (2021) and William Eubank’s Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin (2021) exploit the recent resurgence of folk horror. Both depict a cosmopolitan, urban, and diverse group of young people traveling way out of their comfort zone only to discover an archaic, rural community bound together by old laws and rites and, specifically, by forms of human sacrifice.[i]
