British-Iranian director Babak Anvari is presenting his latest intriguing feature film, Hallow Road, in the Neuchâtel International Fantastic Film Festival’s Third Kind section. Shot almost entirely inside a car and primarily focusing on the angst-stricken faces of its two protagonists, Maddie (the breathtaking Rosamund Pike) and Frank (an incredible Matthew Rhys), Hallow Road is a sometimes oppressive psychological thriller revolving around a couple in crisis who are trying to save their teenage daughter. Based on an original screenplay that’s both Machiavellian and razor-sharp (and written by William Gillies), Hallow Road explores the sense of guilt which can upset an already precarious family equilibrium and an attempt to repress extreme feelings which are an inevitable part of being human. Babak Anvari takes hold of this chilling story with panache, transposing its dark and mysterious atmosphere into moving images.

Stressed executive Frank and his paramedic wife with depressive tendencies Maddie, live in a remote house with their teenage daughter Alice, played by Megan McDonnell, who hardly ever appears in person in the film but whose voice we mainly hear when she’s on the phone with her parents. Alice is a problematic and vulnerable student who has a complicated and conflict-ridden relationship with her parents. Following a blazing row, Alice takes off in her father’s car and vanishes into a remote forest where the local teenagers meet up to smoke weed, a mysterious place which seems to hide bloodcurdling secrets in its depths. Frank and Maddie are beside themselves, they don’t know what to do, suffocated and appalled by an out-of-control situation. Stuck in the family home, waiting to hear from their daughter, the two parents’ distress begins to mount. But then, Megan unexpectedly calls her mother, telling her she’s accidentally run over a girl and asking her to come and save her from a seemingly desperate situation.

Almost all of the film unfolds inside the car which Frank and Maddie have taken to find their daughter, which acts as a claustrophobic hot house for all the fears and anxieties eating away at the two protagonists. Frank, who’s always spoiled and indulged his daughter, in spite of family tensions, starts to think about how to save her from a terrifying fate. But the situation only grows worse, despite his cunning plan, and as the two protagonists draw closer to the heart of the forest, an oppressive darkness comes over them, revealing its deepest secrets.

An agonising genre film, Hallow Road starts out as a family-focused thriller about two parents fighting to save their daughter, but then, frame by frame, it morphs into a dark story with unexpected twists, to put it mildly. And it’s this brutal, radical shift which turns the film into a unique cinematographic experience, a dramatic tour de force which keeps the audience under pressure from beginning to end. Rosamund Pike and Matthew Rhys have the difficult task of carrying the entire film, from beginning to end, of using their facial expressions and voices to express the fears and anxieties of two characters who are trying not to lose control, even when everything’s falling apart around them. This is the guiding thread of the story: the inner turmoil the parents are forced to contend with, the inhuman efforts they make so as not to give into sudden, paralysing panic. Just how far is a parent prepared to go to save their own son or daughter? Hallow Road is an aesthetically powerful film which traps the audience in a suffocating web of secrets and repressed emotions, an intentionally ambiguous film which no-one will come out of unscathed.

Hallow Road was produced by XYZ Films (USA), Hail Mary Pictures (Ireland) and Two and Two Pictures (UK), and is sold worldwide by Universal Pictures (UK and Ireland).