Midsommar

Christian (Jack Reynor - Macbeth) is on the verge of taking the advice of all his friends, and dumping his girlfriend, Dani (Florence Pugh – Fighting with my Family). However, when Dani suffers a death in the family, he bottles it and instead invites her along with him (and a bunch of his mates), to a nine day Midsummer festival in the wilds of Sweden. This sounds to them like a terrible idea but when they arrive, the sun is shining, they’re surrounded by happy, picturesque-looking families wearing flowers, and it’s hard to imagine wanting to be anywhere else... However, it’s not long before each of them sees something which makes everything start to seem less like a wholesome family festival, but something far more sinister… However, since they’ve been inhaling and drinking so many strange-smelling herbal concoctions for days, who knows whether they can trust anything they see?

To give too much detail would spoil the end, but like Hereditary, Ari Aster demonstrates his finely honed skill in creating an unsettled feeling in the pit of your stomach, then constantly building it up and up, until the visceral and shocking climax. Not one for the fainthearted.

Natalie Tyldesley-Marshall