In the Winter Dark

Not a blatant horror movie by any means, this 1998 Australian film does boast a superbly scary atmosphere, which is created by an accumulation of character detail and the picture’s setting, a creepy backwoods community. The plot finds an older couple (Brenda Blethyn, Ray Barrett) and two younger residents (Miranda Otto, Richard Roxburgh) coping with a series of mysterious animal killings. Although all four of the characters are likely candidates to be the psycho, director James Bogle avoids the usual thriller clichés and instead lets his four leads expertly inhabit their characters, as viewers wait for the inevitable explosion of violence.

Shelf Talk: Winter is a low-profile item that deserves a push to viewers looking for a more subdued sort of horror movie. Otto and Roxburgh are familiar to American viewers (she from The Lord of the Rings trilogy and War of the Worlds; he from Van Helsing), but Blethyn is the only readily recognizable name, given the recent arthouse success of the comedy Introducing the Dwights.