Shocktober 2024 - Cobweb (2023)

“When you were born, our parents were overjoyed. When I was born, they screamed.” – Sarah

Here’s a criminally overlooked horror movie that slipped between the cracks of Oppenheim and Barbie in the summer of ’23. Two things immediately bother me here, the first is why anybody anywhere would ever bother releasing anything on the same weekend as those two blockbusters that were guaranteed to dominate. The second is who the hell releases Halloween themed movies in the middle of summer? But that’s what happened. I have a vague recollection of Cobweb playing maybe a week in the multiplex and it was gone before I had a chance.

I had decided last year some time that this was going to feature in the ’24 Shocktober, and when I pulled the disc and started watching, I realised that somehow, I had never ever watched the disc. How this had been overlooked, I have no idea, but having said that – it’s a perfect Halloween movie. (My dumb ass didn’t even KNOW it was a Halloween movie – that was just a happy accident.)

It’s a dark, disturbing story that really should make the film a Halloween favourite, but due to the ineptness of its release and virtually NO advertising or publicity has just sunk without a trace of it ever having existed. And that’s a fate it just doesn’t deserve. Hopefully, somebody out there, reading this, will give the movie a look. It deserves an audience.

So, it’s late October. Peter (Woody Norman) is an introverted 8-year-old. Outwardly, he lives a more or less normal existence with his parents Carol (Lizzie Caplan) and Mark (Antony Starr). But a peek behind the curtains shows us the disturbing truth. Their house seems bare to the point of being barren, with very few homely touches and no warmth. Despite Peter clearly being somewhat troubled by bullying, the parents are cold and distant to the extent of being emotionally retarded.

Anyway, as I mentioned, it’s late October and Peter, naturally wants to go trick or treating with like all the other kids. Nothing wrong in that – right? Yeah, Carol and Mark will have no part of it, because some years earlier and trick or treater went missing a few years ago and nobody ever found her. So, no chance of some harmless fun for Peter.

Peter starts hearing noises within his bedroom wall. He tells his parents, but they basically don’t want to know. Peter is terrified, as anybody would be, especially when the noises start including a voice calling his name, telling him his parents are evil and trapped her in the walls. Peter’s fears start manifesting themselves in drawings he makes at school, showing him terrified in a dark room, with the words “help me”. Concerned, his teacher Miss Devine (Cleopatra Coleman) visits the home, but is met coldly by Carol to say the least. Peter receives a severe telling off for taking his imaginary delusions to school.

As Halloween approaches, the class bully decided to step up his campaign against Peter, destroying his pumpkin. Crying in his bed, Pete hears the wall voice telling him to stand up for himself, so the next day, Peter pushes the kid down a flight of stairs, breaking his leg – and for this, he gets expelled. Not only that, but his parents punish him by locking him in the cellar. Overnight. While there, he finds a concealed pit, with chains.

However grim things seem at this point, they’re going to get a whole lot worse, and quickly.

The voice in the wall tells Peter she is Sarah, his older sister and when he was born, the parents didn’t want her around any more so thy imprisoned her and they’ll do the same to him, and this all happened on Halloween. The girl who went missing was an innocent trick or treater who tried to help. She was killed and is buried in the garden in a shallow grave. Terrified, Peter is convinced he has to kill his parents to save himself, and he laces their food with rat poison and cuts the phone line so they can’t call for help. His mother’s last words are a plea not to let Sarah free.

Naturally, he lets Sarah free and she’s revealed as a grotesquely misshapen feral monstrosity who has been manipulating Peter to murder the parents in revenge for their treatment of her – and now she’s loose. Next on her list is Peter himself, whom she’ll insanely jealous of. Add to all this the class bully and some older friends assuming Peter’s in the house alone, and deciding to stage a home invasion and we have a blood drenched free-for-all of a finale to a movie that I urge you to spend an evening with during the spooky season. You’ll thank me.

As Steve pointed out, it has an eerie, unmistakable Hansel & Gretel kind of feel to it. A truly disturbing modern day fairy tale.