Movies
‘Scurry’ Review – A Spider Creature Feature Hampered by its One-Shot Gimmick
Limitations can be a fuel for creativity when encountered by passionate artists—and this is especially true in the world of film. And when it comes to filmmaking, what bigger flex is there than limiting yourself to a single take and refusing to engage with the shortcuts offered by editing? Understandably enough, this kind of advanced craftsmanship is rare in the indie sphere due to the sheer difficulty of achieving seamless oners without Hollywood levels of time and resources, but it’s not impossible.
That’s why Australian filmmaker Luke Sparke (best known for this year’s Primitive War) decided that he wasn’t about to let something as silly as a “budget” get in the way of creating a respectable single-take thriller, with the result of his ambitious filmmaking experiment being the apocalyptic creature feature Scurry.
Written by frequent Sparke collaborator Tom Evans, Scurry is similar to the director’s previous projects in that it’s meant to look and feel much more expensive and blockbustery than it actually is. And while the film’s marketing is riding on the moderate success of Primitive War, Scurry was actually completed before that movie, with its wide release having been held back until Sparke was a more bankable name.
In the completed film, we follow Jamie Costa as Mark, an ordinary man who finds himself trapped in a series of tunnels underneath a metropolitan city undergoing a giant monster attack. Making his way through the dark, Mark stumbles upon fellow survivor Kate (Emalia), a thief willing to do whatever it takes to survive, with the reluctant duo soon discovering that these cramped tunnels are home to a gigantic species of predatory arachnid.
What follows is a claustrophobic thriller almost completely confined to cavernous sets and dimly lit corridors, with Sparke characterizing the location itself as an even greater antagonist than the supernaturally large spiders. In theory, this premise alone should be worth the price of admission, as a down-to-earth take on classic disaster movie tropes is an undeniably great idea, but it’s precisely the potential for a great genre experience that makes Scurry’s rushed script and poorly executed gimmick so frustrating.
While elaborate oners are a great way of establishing sustained tension, they only work if there’s always an element of interest onscreen to keep viewers engaged, such as Birdman’s energetic soundtrack or Presence’s supernatural voyeurism. Unfortunately, Scurry’s confined setting and minimalist storytelling mean that there’s plenty of visual dead air during sequences that almost certainly would have been reduced to a quick montage in a regular production. This is made worse by the presence of obvious digital trickery meant to stitch together different shots.
That’s not to say that the illusion of a single take isn’t impressive, as the commitment to the real-time gimmick forces Luke and his team to find clever workarounds in order to deliver certain information to the viewer without breaking their own rules (which is why I appreciate the inclusion of a night-vision-enhanced camcorder that allows us brief looks at the creatures without breaking immersion), but you consistently get the feeling that the pacing would be much improved if we could cut away from repetitive reaction shots and constant crawling.
Of course, many of these issues can be blamed on the underdeveloped script, with the main problem here ultimately boiling down to how we’ve seen this kind of story before in movies like Cloverfield and even Gareth Edwards’ Monsters. Despite the unique premise, the screenplay contains no particularly original characters or story beats, and that’s not even mentioning the series of logical inconsistencies that make the otherwise apocalyptic situation seem quite silly.
Costa and Emalia do what they can to elevate the material, with Emalia in particular adding a lot of depth to her character through exaggerated reactions, but no amount of acting can make up for narrative twists and turns you can see coming from a mile away. Even the overly-dramatic ending feels more like a cop-out than a horrific punchline, though I get the feeling that it would have played out much better with a bigger budget.
Thankfully, the monster designs should provide arachnophobes with plenty of nightmare fuel, though as someone with no particular distaste for spiders, I frequently found myself wishing that the film had invested in practical effects work rather than CGI. I mean, the minimal lighting could have easily hidden the inherent jank of low-budget puppetry, and arachnid exoskeletons already move like creepy little animatronics. That being said, I appreciate the flick’s occasional moments of over-the-top gore, as well as how Sparke borrows a page from The Descent when it comes to allowing audiences to see more of the environment than the characters inhabiting it.
As a fan of street-level depictions of blockbuster situations (like what you might see in games like Disaster Report or City Shrouded in Shadow) and a vehement defender of indie filmmakers doing their best to invade creative spaces usually dominated by large studios, I managed to enjoy Scurry despite recognizing that it would have been more entertaining as a short film – or maybe even a briskly paced found footage flick where the monsters only appear during night-vision segments.
Scurry probably won’t crawl its way onto any best-of-the-year lists, with its shallow characters and derivative story making it feel more like someone’s half-remembered dream of a movie rather than an actual film, but there’s still enough memorable imagery here to keep it from being a slog. Just make sure to bring some bug spray if you choose to watch this one.
Scurry releases on VOD on October 3, 2025.
Ghostface is back on the big screen this weekend… well, sort of… with the release of Scary Movie, which marks the Wayans brothers’ return to the horror spoof franchise for the first time since Scary Movie 2 back in the day. It’s likely to be the talk of the horror community for the weekend, but don’t overlook the other six genre movies that were freshly unleashed today.
Here’s all the new horror that released on Friday, June 5, 2026.
The horror spoof franchise is back with Scary Movie now playing in theaters!
Marlon Wayans (“Shorty”), Shawn Wayans (“Ray”), Anna Faris (“Cindy”), and Regina Hall (“Brenda”) reunite for the new Scary Movie, with the cast also including Dave Sheridan, Lochlyn Munro, Cheri Oteri, Chris Elliott, Jon Abrahams, Damon Wayans Jr., Gregg Wayans, Kim Wayans, Benny Zielke, Cameron Scott Roberts, Heidi Gardner, Olivia Rose Keegan, Ruby Snowber, Savannah Lee Nassif, Sydney Park, and Felissa Rose.
Twenty-six years after outrunning a suspiciously familiar masked killer (“Ghostface”), the Core Four are back in the killer’s crosshairs and no horror movie IP is safe…
Scary Movie will slash through reboots, remakes, requels, prequels, sequels, spin-offs, elevated horror, origin stories, anything with the word legacy in it, and every “final chapter” that absolutely isn’t. A whole lot has changed in the horror genre since the Wayans Brothers were in charge of the franchise; their involvement ended with Scary Movie 2 back in 2001!
Michael Tiddes (A Haunted House) directs Scary Movie 6 from a script written by Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, original Scary Movie director Keenen Ivory Wayans, Craig Wayans (Scary Movie 2), and Rick Alvarez (A Haunted House).
From IFC, shark attack movie Chum is now available on Digital.
Alice Eve (Haunting of Queen Mary) stars in shark attack movie alongside Eric Michael Cole, Jim Klock, Elle Haymond, Lisa Yaro, Johnny Gaffney, and Sarah Siadat.
This one sounds very similar to last year’s Dangerous Animals…
Here’s the plot: “A newlywed couple joins friends on a Mediterranean yacht excursion, only to find themselves caught between a predatory shark and a psychopathic killer in their midst-transforming a sun-drenched escape into a fight for survival.”
Jonathan Zuck directs Chum, from a script by Jonathan Zuck and Joe Leone.
Samara Weaving (Ready or Not 2: Here I Come) and Kyle Gallner (Strange Darling) come together in Carolina Caroline, a sexy crime thriller now playing in theaters.
It’s not a horror movie, mind you, but it’s worth a mention here all the same.
Kyra Sedgwick (Family Movie) and Jon Gries also star in the romantic crime thriller.
Director Adam Carter Rehmeier’s film stars Samara Weaving as Caroline Daniels, whose desire to leave her small Texas town brings her into the orbit of a charismatic con man (Kyle Gallner), and together they weave a path of crime and passion across the American Southeast.
Adam Rehmeier previously directed the films Dinner in America and Snack Shack.
Tom Dean wrote the screenplay for Carolina Caroline.
Similar to Steven Spielberg’s upcoming big screen blockbuster Disclosure Day, Signal One explores humankind’s enduring question: what if we aren’t alone in the universe?
The sci-fi thriller is now available on Digital.
Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan), Josh Hutcherson (Five Nights at Freddy’s), David Thewlis (Harry Potter), Raoul Bhaneja (Possessor), Emma Ho (“The Expanse”), and Dennis Quaid (The Substance) star in Signal One from director Jonathan Sobol (The Art of the Steal).
When tech billionaire Sam Houston (Quaid) hires the brilliant computer scientist Annika (Fuhrman), she ventures to an isolated facility run by the brilliant, nihilistic creator of LITTLEMOUTH, a machine which can communicate with alien intelligence.
Annika soon learns some humanity-altering facts: that we are not alone in the universe, that alien intelligences are communicating around us at every moment, and that we are likely too primitive to even remotely understand what they are trying to tell us.
When the goal of the endeavor shifts from listening to talking back, the project rapidly devolves into chaos. With contact comes consequences, and soon Annika and the team must work to ensure the very survival of our species.
A schoolyard dare becomes an urban legend in the creepypasta-inspired horror anthology The Summoning. The indie film is now available on Digital from Brainstorm Media.
“A babysitting gig becomes a nightmare of urban legend when three teens summon Baby Blue. Survival depends on uncovering the past to escape a mother’s wrath from beyond the grave.”
Felipe Vargas (Rosario, Hive), Sergio Gonzalez, Brandon Piskorik, Corey Benson Powers, and Brian Sepanzyk direct the segments. Valeria San Martín, Justina Ceballos, Daniela Flombaum, Nannu Spannauss, Agustín Olcese, and Giovanni Onetti star.
The Summoning is written by Camilo Zaffora.
Happy Death Day actress Jessica Rothe stars as a mom struggling to keep her grip on her sanity and memory in the mind-bending Affection, now available on Digital at home.
In Affection, “Afflicted by a mysterious condition that resets her memory, Ellie becomes trapped in a cyclical nightmare with a man who claims to be her husband. She soon must uncover the horrifying truth of her existence—before she forgets it all again.“
Joseph Cross (“Big Little Lies”) and Julianna Layne (“Chicago P.D.”) also star in the sci-fi horror thriller. Affection marks the feature debut by writer/director BT Meza.
Daniel Kurland wrote in his review out of the film’s premiere, “Affection is steeped in existential questions and fears that plague modern society, while it embraces the ethos of the ’80s through bold body horror. Add to that Rothe’s revelatory performance, and Affection is a hidden gem that will connect with your mind, body, and soul.”
Lucile Hadžihalilović’s latest dark fairy tale, The Ice Tower, loosely reimagines Hans Christian Andersen’s fable “The Snow Queen,” and it’s now streaming on Shudder.
In the ’70s set film, “Jeanne, a 15-year-old orphan, witnesses the shoot of a film adaptation of the fairy tale The Snow Queen, and she becomes fascinated by its star Cristina (Marion Cotillard), an actress who is just as mysterious and alluring as the Queen she is playing.“
Clara Pacini stars as Jeanne. August Diehl and Marine Gesbert also star in The Ice Tower, and look for a cameo from director Gaspar Noé (Climax, Irréversible).
“For me, The Ice Tower solidified Lucile Hadžihalilović’s place amongst the most fascinating creators of fairy tales today,” said distributor Yellow Veil Pictures co-founder Joe Yanick.
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