An acerbic American author (Adam Scott) travels to Ireland to scatter his parents’ ashes, only to find his hotel – where he parents spent their honeymoon – may be haunted.

There is something tremendously old-fashioned about Hokum, the latest horror film by Irish writer/director Damian McCarthy. It is liberally soaked in standard tropes and stereotypes, and very closely resembles the sort of traditional ghost story from Edwardian author M.R. James and his imitators. Some great horror films are great because they present audiences with something genuinely new and innovative. Others succeed because they find fresh and interesting angles on old tropes and stereotypes. Then there are films like Hokum, which honestly wins its audience over by knowing what works and executing it in a near-flawless fashion.

McCarthy’s previous feature Oddity (2024) was a less successful hodge-podge of innovative ideas and wobbly stereotypes, and while that film certainly becomes a lot more enjoyable with familiarity Hokum feels a more accomplished and assured work from the outset. Its strength comes not from innovation but from a charming set of distinctive characters and a keen understanding of what makes a scary moment work. Your appreciation for the classic “jump scare”, assuming you have one, is well catered for by McCarthy here. Generally speaking, the viewer is startled because there is actually something scary on screen; the film largely avoids false scares of the “Lewton’s bus”, cat-jumps-out variety.

A great deal of Hokum‘s quality comes down to a talented cast playing interesting characters. Adam Scott is a case in point: his character, American author Ohm Bauman, is an irascible and antisocial sort of person. His personality ranges from the curmudgeonly to the deeply depressed, and his cynicism at supernatural legends is matched by his genuinely mean-spirited interactions with the hotel staff. There is a visible risk, in fact, of the screenplay turning Ohm into someone too unlikeable to follow. Scott’s smart, humorous performance finds the balance. He makes Ohm prickly, but funny.

Another highlight is David Wilmot as Jerry, a homeless man living in the woods near the hotel who habitually drinks hallucinogen-laced milk and may or may not have murdered his own wife. Again an interesting, somewhat complicated character is infused with life by an actor’s smart creative choices and performing talent. The supporting cast are all delivering strong work here, including Peter Coonan, Florence Ordesh, Michael Patric, and Will O’Connell as the various staffers at the Bilberry Woods Hotel.

With much of the heat in the horror scene currently taken up by the likes of Backrooms and Obsession – both excellent films – there is a risk that the sort of traditional, well-staged horror offered by Hokum will be overlooked or under-appreciated. This is high quality, enormously effective stuff, and an absolute treat for genre fans with a taste for the classics.