UNTIL DAWN

(director/writer: David F. Sandberg; screenwriters: story by Gary Dauberman/ Dauberman, Blair Butler; cinematographer: Maxime Alexandre; editor: Michelle Aller; music: Benamin Wallfisch; cast: Ella Rubin (Clover), Odessa A’Zion (Nina), Ji-young Yoo (Megan), Belmont Cameli (Abel), Peter Stormare (Hill), Mariann Borbala Hermanyi (Glore Witch), Lotta Losten (Reporter), Michael Cimino (Max), Tibor Szauervein (Masked Killer); Runtime: 103; MPAA Rating: R; producers: Gary Dauberman, Roy Lee, Lotta Losten, Mia Maniscaico, Carter Swan, Asad Qiziibash, David F. Sandberg; Screen Gems/Vertigo; 2025)

“Schlocky and forgettable.”

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
A schlocky and forgettable scare-free horror movie based on a Playstation video game of the same name. Director/writer David F. Sandberg (“Shazam!”/”Lights Out”) co-writes it with Blair Butler and Gary Dauberman. It’s based on Dauberman’s story.

It has been a year since Melanie, the older sister of the twentysomething Clover (Ella Rubin) vanished, after the housemates argued.

Clover and her friends — the hellraiser Nina (Odessa A’Zion), Megan (Ji-young Yoo), Clover’s ex Max (Michael Cimino) and Abel (Belmont Cameli) — hit the road to go to a remote mountain resort in Pennsylvania, to trace the spot where Melanie was last seen. They end up searching in the fictional Glore Valley, where there are reports of missing people. It leads to them being trapped in a run-down haunted manor, where they are forced to relive their deaths in an endless time loop as a masked killer slaughters them one by one but return to life only to die again. We learn that they will survive only if they can stay alive until dawn.

Only the exploding bodies kept me awake, as I tried to watch this muddled and unimaginative film in spite of being bored to death and being a hater of video games.

REVIEWED ON 4/29/2025  GRADE: C+
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