Daddy’s Head (2024) 

Following the death of a father, his son and son’s stepmother stay in the house where something is watching them, something that is eerily familiar. 

Written and directed by Benjamin Barfoot, this slow burn of a folk horror film will pull some viewers right and never let them go and leave other almost completely cold. Unfortunately, this viewer had a hard time getting into the story. It feels like something is missing and while the story is the definition of slow burn, sneeze and an important detail might be missing. The writing and direction here do go hand in hand quite well but the story here is missing something. Yes, there are some really strong sequences and some truly creepy moment, but it feels like something is missing, or perhaps the pacing is off enough to cause this feeling. There is a decent story here, it just needs to be dug out of the characters.  

The acting here is decent, not spectacular, but definitely decent. The two leads, Isaac and Laura, are quite good, the performances by James Harper-Jones and Julia Brown work well here with the story and together as people who have lost their center of life and need to find a new way of living while grieving and potentially having a something living with them. Nathaniel Martello-White as Robert brings good balance to the main characters. His presence seems to be the new center and one that helps bring sanity to everything going on. The supporting cast works well as well. 

The film’s cinematography here is dark, real dark, as in lacking light and not as in a creeping darkness in most scenes. The work here could have used more light, having to turn the screen’s brightness to maximum setting and still not seeing everything that needs to be seen is an issue, one that could easily be fixed with just a touch of carefully placed lighting. A few sequences do look great though. The editing here works decently well but does participate and add to the pacing issues. The scenes as well edited, but someone, somewhere, at some point in production should have helped with the pacing. To be noted, there are a few really cool transitions, but they do get lost in the fray. 

Daddy’s Head is a film some will love, as mentioned above, but for many, including this viewer, something was missing, the pacing was off, and everything else was just decent. This is a case where a slightly shorter film (like a medium length film) could have told this story in a much scarier way. Because that is the main thing here, this is supposed to be a creepy film, but the pacing (and the writing at times) completely kills any semblance of tension or suspense the story might have had. Yes, there are a few creepy, spooky scenes, but they are not enough to save the film from itself.