Hellcat (2025) Review – Nearly But Not Quite Shudder Horror

Welcome to Knockout Horror and to our review of Shudder exclusive Hellcat (2025). This is a movie that left me feeling a little bit mixed. In fact, my prevailing thought was “man I am not looking forward to reviewing this”. If you have a Shudder subscription, you might as well check it out but let’s talk about why I felt like that.

Burying the Lede

Hellcat is a bit of a tough movie to talk about because its main plotline is also something of a spoiler. I’ll try to keep it spoiler-free as I think you need to go into this movie knowing as little as possible.

The story follows Lena (Dakota Gorman), a young woman who wakes up locked in the back of moving camping trailer. The person towing the trailer, Clive (Todd Terry), tells her they have to get her to a doctor within an hour as she has a rapid moving infection. Little does she realise, it’s something much more sinister than she could have possibly imagined.

To say anything else would basically spoil the big reveal.

This speaks to something that I find quite interesting with horror, as of late. There’s a grand assumption, in producers, that people will just watch their movies without them having to target a specific audience.

There’s rarely a mention of specifics and the grand reveal has become a big selling point. It’s a fascinating step away from the front cover basically telling you everything you need to know about a film and the blurb on the back confirming it.

Let’s just say, Hellcat falls under a very specific horror trope, but director Brock Bodell has attempted to do something different with it in order to subvert viewer expectation, just a little. Does it work? That’s hard to say.

It’s been a popular festival film

You’ll probably notice that 2025 date attached to the title above. Hellcat has been doing the festival circuit for awhile now.

“There’s a lot that Bodell does right with this film but a whole lot that makes it a tough recommend.”

It first appeared in July of 2025 at Fantasia International Film Festival and then bounced around the scene for the next 10 months. This is quite typical for horror movies as they show off their product to potential distributors. Shudder picked it up, released it in mid-August 2026, and the rest is history.

The strange thing is, sitting at over 80% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes and boasting a whole ton of 5 star festival reviews in its trailer, the audience response has been a lot less positive.

Currently sitting at 4.7/10 on IMDb and 2.6/5 on Letterboxd, this is a classic example of the difference between what a critic wants from a film and what an audience wants. There’s a lot that Bodell does right with this film but a whole lot that makes it a tough recommend.

Technically, very well made

From a technical standpoint, there’s bags to praise here. This is, likely, a fairly low budget horror movie, but you really wouldn’t guess it.

Cinematography is fantastic, albeit very dark, and Andrew Duensing makes the absolute most of the small space that we spend the vast majority of our time in.

Lena is locked inside one of those classic American Airstream Trailers but the way Bodell has setup shots to incorporate flashbacks makes it feel larger than it is.

The relatively restricted space lends this movie a real “chamber piece” vibe for much of the runtime and I really enjoyed that. There’s lots of dialogue so keep that in mind but it works tremendously well. The conversations between Clive and Lena are really compelling and both performances are strong.

It’s a long time before we know what is wrong with Lena and Clive isn’t exactly forthcoming with details, in the lead up. Is the infection real? Are Clive’s intentions pure? What does the infection do? It’s all so easy to buy into.

The gradual drip feeding of information keeps you champing at the bit for more and the tension builds with every interaction. The appearance of a mystery girl only heightens that.

The first half of the movie is extremely strong and that’s why I feel so mixed about it.

“The conversations between Clive and Lena are really compelling and both performances are strong.”

If Bodell had kept focusing on what worked and what made Hellcat feel so utterly unique within its subgenre, this would have been a very easy recommend. Unfortunately, that’s not the case.

A woeful second half

Naturally, I watch thousands of horror movies and there is one thing that I see over and over.

So many writers seem to have the crux of an idea but not a fully formed narrative. They excel at writing the concept and integrating that into the early parts of the story, but then have no idea where to go with it or how to wrap it up.

That’s exactly the case with Hellcat.

The second half pivots away from being an interesting and tense chamber piece into a derivative and trope heavy thriller movie with none of the intrigue, some extremely hokey dialogue, and questionable character actions.

Even worse than that is the inclusion of an underwhelming ending that attempts to subvert expectation but will likely just confuse some viewers and make the rest chuckle.

I absolutely hated it and both my fiancee and me were left in hysterics at the practical effects used in the final shots. It’s sort of baffling in a way because Bodell is trying so hard to sideswipe the viewer that he tangles himself in a knot that he really can’t write his way out of.

The early parts of the movie are so strong that it almost makes the second half decline more of an issue.

The real problem

The real problem with that terrible second half and the divisive ending is that it will leave viewers feeling like they have wasted their time for an underwhelming payoff. This, in turn, will cause them to reassess the film entirely and deem the strong first half to actually just be a boring slow march to formulaic thriller redundancy.

Again, it shines a light on festival expectations and audience expectations.

Audiences want a strong story, lots of tension, and a satisfying payoff. Festival audiences are likely to overrate because they are just glad they aren’t watching another three hour arthouse piece about peat bogs.

“The early parts of the movie are so strong that it almost makes the second half decline more of an issue.”

Hellcat’s somewhat unique take on a very common horror trope is daring, but I am not sure whether it works. The second half is enormously formulaic and the subversive ending feels like a bit of a miss. A poor payoff for the tension and intrigue of the early parts of the film.

With that being said, it’s still worth a watch if you have Shudder. It’s nice to see refreshing takes on old horror topics and that first half is both compelling and tense. It’s just a shame they don’t manage to stick the landing.

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.