Caveat (2020) Movie Review - Damian Mc Carthy's Haunting Debut

Welcome to Knockout Horror. We recently reviewed Damian Mc Carthy’s absolutely fantastic new horror movie Oddity. While movies like MaXXXine, Longlegs and A Quiet Place: Day One having been getting much of the horror hype, as of late. Oddity has quietly snuck in as, in my opinion, the best horror movie of 2024 by quite a long way. Today we are taking a look at his horror debut Caveat from 2020.

A Creepy Slow Burn

Caveat follows the story of drifter Isaac (John French). Isaac was involved in an accident which left him with some significant brain trauma. As a result, he suffers from amnesia. Desperate for work, he takes on a well paying job taking care of a woman. The only catch is that the home is located on a remote island, only accessible by boat, and the girl’s family has something of a complicated past. All of this is compounded by the woman’s psychological complications, meaning this job might not be quite as simple as it seems.

Caveat plays out in a similar manner to Oddity. It’s a slow paced movie that acts as something of a ghost story. Slowly unfurling and drip feeding in revelations about the characters and their complex pasts. The movie takes place over a small period of time with flashback sequences interlaced to provide story exposition. For those of you who enjoyed Oddity, this is going to feel pretty familiar.

Micro Budget

This was Mc Carthy’s debut feature length movie and, as a result, finding backers was tough. People aren’t keen to give money to young directors with a limited history in making movies. So Mc Carthy was forced to do what he could with what little he had. The estimated budget here is around £250,000 but, I would imagine, in reality the sum likely fell far short of this amount.

Mc Carthy was lucky enough to be friends with a relative of the family who own Bantry House in County Cork. Leading to him filming the movie there. Building various sets to hide the actual beauty of the location. And Mc Carthy even resorted to eBay to purchase some of the movie’s props.

The crazy thing is, you wouldn’t guess that this was put together on such a shoe string budget. Caveat is beautifully filmed, sets are fantastic in their dilapidated grossness, cinematography is brilliant and the acting is spot on. This is a really good example of a director doing a lot with a little. 

Slow Moving but Compelling Enough

Much like Oddity, Caveat is a slow moving movie. And while it doesn’t quite share the same fantastic pacing as it’s horror relative. It’s still a fantastically compelling watch. The slow burn story is, actually, fairly light on the ground to start with. We know nothing about any of the characters and there are only minor hints of the deeper history coming to fruition later on. The bulk of the early running time is carried by the creepy location and the bizarreness of the situation.

Caveat is an extremely atmospheric movie and it needs every drop of it. Things do take a long time to get going so we are heavily dependent on Isaac’s searching of the house, and the odd behaviour of its inhabitants, to keep us glued to the screen. Once things get going, it is easy to stay engaged. There are just enough revelations to keep things feeling fresh and the pacing catches up quite a bit in the second half. It’s not perfect and some are likely to check out early. But slow burn horror fans shouldn’t have any major complaints.

Legitimately Creepy

The tight, self contained, story confines the characters to one small location but Mc Carthy does a brilliant job extracting every ounce of creepiness out of it. There are some noteworthy horror moments here, as well. Aside from the, obviously, freaky looking rabbit toy that plays host to some excellent scares.

There are a couple of scenes that just have you wincing at the thought of them. One scare, in particular, stands out as a moment of brilliant, uncanny, makeup work and performance acting. There are a couple of scenes here that may just stick with you. Especially if you are easily spooked.

I am grateful to Mc Carthy for not relying on jump scares to throw the viewer off base, as well. It’s always refreshing. Acting is excellent, throughout. Johnny French has some real stand out moments. Especially when tasked with relating his character’s pain and fear. Leila Sykes was equally capable. Making for quite a complex horror character that I kind of wish we had more time to learn about.

Worth Mentioning

It would be remiss of me not to point out some of Caveat’s issues. As mentioned earlier, pacing is a problem. This takes a long time to go anywhere and will definitely lose viewers here and there. I think there is the chance that Caveat might divide people a little, as well. I feel as though some will enjoy the slow pace and lingering tension of the first half. Only to be disappointed by the somewhat lacklustre ending and, perhaps, slightly awkward fitting plot revelations. With the other half having the opposite opinion.

There are a number of plot holes, throughout. Characters seem a bit dumb, at times. Once the story has given up its secrets, there’s a solid chance that you may find said secrets to not actually be that interesting or compelling. There is a distinct sense of some of the plot being underdeveloped and, perhaps, the characters being poorly fleshed out.

There’s a lot of ideas here and many of them simply aren’t well put together or well structured. You will probably be left with questions that there are simply no answers to. Something which can make the entire experience feel a bit unsatisfying and, perhaps, even a bit frustrating. I can’t shake the feeling that some of the stuff here was done purely because the idea is creepy. Without actually having a reason for why it was done or what caused it. Still, as a first effort, the issues are really minimal.

Should You Watch Caveat?

If you enjoy slow burning, unsettling, creepy horror then you should definitely watch Caveat. As a first effort, it is fantastic. There are issues here and there. Pacing isn’t great, some may dislike the ending, some may not find the story all that engaging and there is a sense of, general, underdevelopment to many of the movie’s elements. But the atmosphere is consistently creepy, there are some great scares, the location is fantastic and the story does just enough to keep you watching. Caveat is, certainly, well worth checking out and a brilliant example of how effective low budget horror can be.

Our Scoring Philosophy: A Fair Fight

Horror is a genre that thrives thanks to indie film makers and low budget creators. At Knockout Horror, we firmly believe that every movie that we review deserves a fair fight. That's why we grade on a curve. Our star ratings are all about context, judging a film on what it achieves with the resources it has.

A 4-star rating for a scrappy indie horror made for $10,000 is a testament to its ingenuity and raw power. A 4-star rating for a $100 million blockbuster means it delivered on its epic promises. We don't compare them side-by-side; we celebrate success in every weight class, from the back-alley brawler to the heavyweight champion. Please keep this in mind when considering star ratings.

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