'Cadaver' Preview: Norwegian Netflix horror movie blurs the lines between reality and imagination
Netflix is gearing up to spook one and all this Halloween season. With its upcoming new Norwegian project titles 'Cadaver', the streaming site presents a world that is doomed with little hope for survival. And when the characters do see light at the end of the tunnel, it appears to be only darkness.
A nuclear disaster leaves only a handful of survivors who are left with little to no food. In this starving aftermath of the disaster, people have almost nothing to look forward to. A small family of three - Leonora (Gitte Witt), Jacob (Thomas Gullestad) and their daughter Alice (Tuva Olivia Remman) - is on the edge of survival. They are hungry and starving, but this doomed world has little to offer to them.
All that changes when one day, a charismatic local hotel owner invites the family along with some other survivors to attend a theatre play. This invitation includes a meal as well. The hotelier paints it as a charitable effort to help those in need. This offer, to a starving family, is too good to refuse and so they make the visit.
Only they are unaware of the horrors that await them. The director, Mathias (Thorbjørn Harr), introduces the entire hotel as the stage for a play. The attendees this charitable gala are all provided with masks to help separate them from so-called "actors". It all happens in real-time as is shown in the trailer. The attendees Roman around the hotel seemingly watching a play - but soon enough, it takes an eerie turn.
One after the other, people from the audience start to disappear in the hotel. And the family of three that we've been following is also caught in this nightmare of a play. The official synopsis of the movie says that "the line between reality and theatre quickly gets blurred" - the audience is no longer just mere spectators. Alice disappears right in front of Leo and Jacob and thus commences a horror game of cat and mouse.
There is no room for any doubt anymore - something very sinister is going on in Mathias' hotel. Will the family manage to survive? Written and directed by Jarand Herdal 'Cadaver' will be available to stream on Netflix on October 22.
