The Surrender (2025) review – A weak version of A Dark Song

Welcome to Knockout Horror. Today we are reviewing Shudder Original The Surrender by director Julia Max.

It’s yet another trauma horror movie

This is another one of those metaphorical horror movies that I am getting so tired of. Expect a supernatural horror plot that is actually a metaphor for confronting grief and familial bullshit. Can we get an actual horror movie with some real monsters, spooks, or supernatural stuff, please?

On the plus side, at least The Surrender does offer up some fairly interesting depictions of occult practices. The story is pretty simple. When the family’s patriarch becomes terminally ill. His wife, unable to cope with the impending loss, begins to set the wheels in motion for a resurrection ritual. Along the way, incurring the scorn of her unwilling, and unbelieving, daughter.

“Can we get an actual horror movie with some real monsters, spooks, or supernatural stuff, please?”

We have the whole horror-drama trifecta here. We’ve got feuding family members; we’ve got a mother unable to cope with losing her husband; and we have long hidden familial trauma that kind of makes you question the logic behind the entire plot in the first place. Well, outside of being a clumsy metaphor for the cycle of abuse that is.

Critics love this one, fans not so much

The Surrender features a menagerie of traits that get horror movie critics feeling all tingly in their pants. We have a female director (great to see, we need more women directing horror), we have a lead actor looking rather dishevelled and very atypical of a horror lead, tons of familial drama ala Hereditary, and a “layered” story.

This is “elevated horror” and reviewers are obsessed with it. Me? Not so much. The general horror viewing public? They aren’t all that enthusiastic, either.

Let’s get the positives out of the way, first. For a feature length debut, Max does a pretty nice job with the technical aspect. Shot setups and cinematography are absolutely fine, for the most part. There’s nothing all that original and the movie is replete with imagery that has been done to death, but the film looks crisp and sharp. It certainly seems like it was afforded a decent budget.

A serviceable yet incredibly familiar story

The Surrender’s story is fine but it isn’t going to appeal to all horror fans. It’s a tale of grief and familial trauma set against a backdrop of occultist practice. It is very reminiscent of the excellent Welsh/Irish film A Dark Song or the far inferior From Black. The Surrender is just weighted a little more towards the familial stuff as our mother and daughter combo have some unaddressed issues to deal with.

“It is very reminiscent of the excellent Welsh/Irish film A Dark Song or the far inferior From Black.”

There are some stand out moments that juxtapose the way the daughter perceived her parents growing up versus the reality of the situation. These take place via flashbacks and are definite highlights of the narrative. Unfortunately, they eventually serve to completely undermine the prevailing plot thanks to some clumsy storytelling. It feels a bit baffling from a writing standpoint.

The occultist ritual practice is scattered throughout but comes on full force later in the movie. There are a few creepy moments during the ritual that really do work quite well but it feels a bit too little and a bit too late. There’s a lot of redundant drama before you get there. I imagine The Surrender will have already lost a lot of viewers by this point.

Some of the dialogue is woeful

Colby Minifie and Kate Burton have a mix strong moments of performance and weak moments. I feel like they suffer for some very poorly written dialogue that makes their interactions seem a bit unnatural and stilted. Both have a tendency to ham it up but it’s nothing too distracting. Generally speaking, they are fine.

“The final scenes made me laugh. I sort of imagined the writer shedding a tear… somehow not realising that it was all just a little bit cheesy.”

The familial drama stuff is extremely dull and suffers for the need to introduce scares. This would be a much stronger story if it played out while not wearing a horror movie mask. It’s far too familiar, extremely unoriginal, and nowhere near as smart as it thinks it is. This becomes especially noteworthy later on where the movie starts tying itself in knots for the sake of being “different” and “scary”.

The ritual itself, is pretty awful. The “spooky” guy who shows up to conduct the ceremony it is laughably cliched. Numerous events occur during the ritual that, again, undermine the entire reasoning behind the daughter staying involved. There are a couple of scenes designed purely for shock value and they feel predictable and underwhelming.

The later stages are just a bit silly. Horror vets are going to find some of it ruthlessly projected and the rest just a bit messy and ridiculous. The final scenes made me laugh. I sort of imagined the writer shedding a tear and thinking “That was beautiful” while jotting it down. Somehow not realising that it was all just a little bit cheesy.

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.