Excuse me while I sew my uterus shut (Shelley, 2016)

If horror movies have taught me anything it is this: NEVER GET PREGNANT.

As if the actual process of successfully giving birth wasn’t terrifying and disgusting enough, it has now become a trope so successful it is now its own sub-genre.

Whilst re-watching the Alien franchise again after absolutely loving the new Alien: Covenant; I’ve realised alien (1979, Directed by Ridley Scott) is the mother of all pregnancy movies (see what I did there?). Slimy, gooey, bloody, deadly, terrifying is the whole face-hugger/chest-burster scenario; sounds like childbirth to me. The entire movie is just this huge writhing experience of sex, birth and body horror;if you don’t agree then you just have to see what this guy's blood looks like.

In light of all this swimming around in my head, I felt it was time to watch something that has been on my watch list for a while now: the Danish pregnancy horror ‘Shelley’ (2016, Denmark, directed by Ali Abbasi).

Rich hipsters Louise and Kasper who cannot fall pregnant, convince their housemaid Elena to become their surrogate in return for enough money to get her own place for her and her son.  Soon however it becomes apparent that something is not quite right; is the baby sucking the life force from Elena or is the pressure of surrogacy just causing her to have a breakdown.





I have heard others describe this film as a ‘slow burn’ like it’s a bad thing. It is not a bad thing. Slow burns are great for providing much needed tension and character development. ‘Shelley’ is at the pretty normal time of hr and a half, which is easily sat through thanks to wonderful and unique performances from its main cast, and stunning setting and cinematography. As a viewer I both appreciated the surrounding lake and forest and the seemingly idyllic farm life, while also feeling the crushing weight of isolation and vulnerability our lead character, Elena goes through.

The film is spoken mostly English which is made believable by having Elena be from Romania and English being the only way to communicate. It is also interspersed with Romanian and Danish- this works well to further show Elena’s isolation as the scenes where she is smiling nervously while others speak Danish around her are so awkward it was setting off my anxiety. So, watch this film with subtitles.*

I enjoyed this film immensely, it look the time to develop characters I cared about which in the end paid off when the film comes to a climax and which has ruined knitting needles for me forever.
All in all ‘Shelley’ was an effective psychological horror which thoroughly creeped me the fuck out. For sure I’d give it a well-deserved 8/10.

**, if you are like me and having subtitles on while people are speaking English is the equivalent of nails down a chalk board except on the inside of your brain- I suggest a neat little blocking device you can take on and off when they switch languages. If, however you are a very normal person who isn’t triggered by something so mundane- please continue normally.