"If I were you, I wouldn't want to get hurt even more."
Cuckoo is a 2024 Sci-Fi Horror film from Studio Neon, starring Hunter Schafer, Dan Stevens, Marton Csokas, Jessica Henwick and is directed by Tilman Singer.
After the death of her mother, 17-year-old Gretchen is forced to move in with her father, stepmother, and younger half-sister in a remote Bavarian Alpine town. Soon after arrival, Gretchen notices strange things in the resort and soon learns of sinister secrets in the woods.
Not to be confused with the horror novel of the same name, which also came out the same year, although the two share similar plot elements. Nor with the Russian drama that's about survival in face of a monumental language barrier. Or the British comedy of the same name.
Cuckoo contains examples of
- Advertised Extra: Dan Stevens is given second billing and appears in most promotional material along with Hunter Schafer. Though König is the main Big Bad of the story, he only makes sporadic appearances here and there until the film's climax, and the plot focuses more on Gretchen trying to uncover what's going on at the resort.
- Age-Gap Romance: It's implied Gretchen is less than thrilled by Beth being considerably younger than her father. Jessica Henwick is much closer in age to Hunter Schafer than to Marton Csokas.
- Ambiguous Time Period: The film borrows so heavily from Giallo, it might as well be set in the late 70s/very early 80s, if not for the presence of smartphones and modern ballistic vests. But the sets, large chunk of the fashion and the general aesthetics are straight from that time-frame. Nobody seems to question it or find it in any way weird, so it's not just the old resort being behind the time curve (as the package reveals later on, the whole universe in-story is like this).
- Animal Motifs: The creatures of the wood are likened to cuckoos directly because they reproduce via brood parasitism.
- Anyone Can Die: Of the entire cast, only Gretchen, Alma, and Ed are alive by the end of the film. König, Henry, the hooded woman, Trixie, and a few of the hospital staff are dead, while the fates of Luis and Beth are never clarified.
- Artistic Licence – Geography: Herr König mentions that there are "English schools across the border in Italy". Unless the story is set in Nazi Germany, Italy is not across the border from Bavaria. There is Austria in between.
- Bait-and-Switch: After having defeated the bad guys and kept Alma safe, Gretchen finds that the doors of the hospital are locked. She turns around, preparing to have to do some more fighting and find some other way to get out, only for Alma to push on the other unlocked door and leave.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: Gretchen's protectiveness over Alma makes her trust Gretchen and shield her from the Cuckoo call that deals with both Henry and König.
- Big Bad Friend: Henry, who has served as Gretchen's staunchest ally, turns out to want to kill not only the hooded woman but Alma as well. Gretchen is then forced to stab him in order to save her little sister.
- Big Sister Instinct: Despite having some reservations about Alma at times, Gretchen loves her sister and puts herself in mortal danger to rescue her.
- Bilingual Bonus: Although it is never explicitly mentioned in the film, the German word "Kuckuckskind" (cuckoo's child), which is commonly used as a derogatory term for an illegitimate child, applies to Gretchen's sister Alma both figuratively and, as it turns out, in a more literal sense. Since the film's director, Tilman Singer, is German, this is probably no coincidence.
- Bilingual Dialogue: Gretchen's co-worker Trixie mostly speaks French. None of the German characters seem to have any trouble understanding her, but only ever respond to her in German (including her boyfriend!)
- Bittersweet Ending: A whole lot of people are dead, but the experiment is over and the villains are gone. Gretchen is undeniably traumatized and is now on her own, but she has accepted her role as Alma's big sister.
- Brown Note: The scream of the "Cuckoo" is paralyzing and even causes the victim to undergo a sort of brief time loop where they repeatedly experience taking action in their mind without having actually done so.
- Bumbling Dad: Luis is rather neglectful of Gretchen's emotional well-being to the point that he sells their old family home without telling her.
- Changeling Tale: Like their avian namesakes, the "Cuckoos" are brood parasites that place their children in human families and let the unwitting parents raise them as their own. Gretchen's stepsister Alma turns out to be one such "cuckoo's child".
- Chase Scene: When biking out of work at night, Gretchen notices a shadow by her own and then sees the red-eyed woman behind her. She proceeds to book it, as the woman is able to follow disturbingly close on foot.
- Chekhov's Gag: Upon meeting Gretchen's parents, König mentions that they went to the resort while on their honeymoon eight years prior. While it initially seems like a throwaway line played for a quick Parental Sexuality Squick gag, it later becomes an important plot detail.
- Cowboy Cop: Henry introduces himself to Gretchen as a police officer, but has no qualms about breaking the law himself or putting Gretchen in danger by enlisting her in his investigation. As König later reveals, Henry was actually dismissed from the police force some time ago and has no legal authority whatsoever.
- Cradle of Loneliness: Gretchen breaks down while holding her late mother's belongings when she learns her father sold her house.
- Crusading Widower: Henry lost his wife due to König's "preservation" experiments and is determined to avenge her death by any means necessary.
- Déjà Vu: The scream cause anyone who hears it to loop in a very short interval, repeating the same actions despite world around moving forward - without noticing the repetition itself, but feeling something is off after a few of such loops pass. By that time, they are usually already dead.
- Didn't See That Coming:
- König clearly did not anticipate Gretchen moving to the resort along with her family and considers her to be a liability. At first, he tries to separate her from her family by giving her a job at the resort and to keep her in the dark, only for Gretchen to find out about his Evil Plan anyways and try to stop him.
- Henry, with his single-minded focus on avenging his wife's death and putting a stop to the sinister ongoings at the resort, mixed with his competence in combat and seeming refusal to die, arguably proves to be an even bigger thorn in König's plan.
- Dirty Cop: The two police officers who are regularly seen in and around the resort, Erik and his bald, nameless partner, turn out to be on König's payroll.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: The hooded woman merely wants to reunite with her biological daughter Alma and even stops hunting down Gretchen for a while when she feigns threatening to stab Alma.
- Everyone Has Standards: Though he's more a Well-Intentioned Extremist than actually being evil, Henry is still perfectly fine with killing an innocent eight-year-old girl in his quest to avenge his wife's death. However, he does take his promise to protect Gretchen seriously and seems unwilling to seriously harm her, preferring to either try to knock her unconscious and talk her out of taking Alma with her.
- Evilutionary Biologist: König is driven by his desire to preserve the Cuckoo species, having them impregnate human women with their spawn.
- Face Full of Alien Wing-Wong: The Cuckoos impregnate women by implanting their eggs in them.
- Fake-Hair Drama: The Cuckoos are mostly bald and wear wigs to disguise it. After Gretchen kills one, she throws the bloody wig out to König to confirm its death.
- Fantastic Nature Reserve: The resort turns out to border the habitat of a species of mysterious, predatory humanoids likened closely to "Cuckoos." The owners are there to ensure the creatures persist at the expense of innocent humans.
- Fantastic Racism: Henry's hatred for the Cuckoos is somewhat understandable, considering that one of them was responsible for the death of his wife, but he's taking it to the extreme by vowing to kill every single member of the species, including Alma, who's completely innocent of any wrongdoing.
- Faux Affably Evil: Herr König is almost disturbingly pleasant, even when showcasing his nastiest traits.
- Gender-Blender Name: Ed is a woman.
- Hell Is That Noise: The cuckoo's shriek is devastating to human ears, a high-pitched wail that causes pain and disorientation.
- Hostage Situation: Gretchen holds the Cuckoo at bay by keeping her knife on Alma. The Cuckoo is unwilling to let its offspring be harmed and is thus less aggressive with its scream and stalking as it otherwise would be.
- Humanoid Abomination: The Cuckoos resemble people, but are subtly "off," in ways. Glowing red eyes, dark veins, distended jaws, and of course the scream.
- I Gave My Word: Though Henry has no problem with dragging Gretchen along into dangerous situations or killing her eight-year-old sister, he's unwilling to directly harm Gretchen since he had promised her that he would protect her. Gretchen actually uses this to her advantage in order to escape the hospital with her sister, staying close to Alma's side so that neither Henry nor König can shoot either of them.
- I Miss Mom: Gretchen is a teenager whose mother has just died and her character arc involves coming to terms with the grief involved.
- It Began with a Twist of Fate: Gretchen is put in a position to expose and end the experiments by virtue of encountering the Cuckoo on a late-night bike ride. It just so happens she chose to wear headphones to blast her music and thus was invulnerable to the creature's scream. Had she not, the Cuckoo would have caught and either impregnated or killed her right there.
- It Can Think: The Cuckoo is far from an unintelligent brute. Gretchen soon realizes it's very smart and able to utilize tactics.
- It's Personal: It's implied holding Alma at knifepoint turns Gretchen from prey or obstacle into a personal nemesis for the Cuckoo. It is noticeably angrier and more persistent in hunting her down after this.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Gretchen is cold and abrasive to almost everyone she meets and refuses to recognize Alma as her sister. Much of her disposition appears to be motivated by grief, and in time she comes to care for Alma. She also lets her guard down around Ed, where she reveals herself to be awkward, kind and passionate about her interests, and later shows Henry genuine sympathy after learning of his wife's death.
- Kick the Dog: Henry shows how dangerous he is in his goals when he shoves over rather voluminous shelves to trap the Cuckoo with no regard for catching Gretchen up in the resulting devastation.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Exploited. A Cuckoo has ways to make people forget things or loop in confusing déjà vu. This allows to perform the whole egg-swapping, without the surrogate parents ever knowing.
- Laughably Evil: König being so Obviously Evil in spite of his seeming pleasantness, his tendency to sneak up on people, and Dan Stevens clearly having a lot of fun with the role makes him a very funny character to follow in the first half of the film. Then the second half rolls around and he drops all pretense of trying to be friendly after his plans are revealed, thus becoming a legitimately scary villain.
- Logical Weakness: The Cuckoos use their piercing screams to paralyze their victims, and thus are far less dangerous if one can block out hearing them.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: It's never explained where the Cuckoos come from. The villains' talk about them as if they naturally evolved and even refer to them by a scientific name, Homo cuculidae. But the ability of their screams to catch humans in a "time loop" of sorts leaves the door open if they are supernatural, if there is some natural explanation for it, or if it is simply a hallucination/disorientation the scream brings on.
- Mexican Standoff: König and Henry keep each other at bay, neither being able to reach Alma without risking being shot.
- Moment Killer: Gretchen and Ed's romantic departure is interrupted brutally by the Cuckoo standing in the road and screaming, leading to a car crash.
- Monster Is a Mommy: The Cuckoo's behavior is partially because it is seeking its daughter Alma to reclaim her.
- Mourning an Object: Gretchen is devastated by her father selling off her late mother's home, viewing it as a betrayal.
- Mutual Kill: Henry and König finish each other off by shooting one another at the same time.
- Never Trust a Trailer: The trailer makes it seem as though Gretchen is heavily injured during her encounter with the Hooden Woman on her bike. In reality, she gets away from that encounter essentially unscathed and instead is heavily injured a bit later in a car crash while trying to leave the area with Ed.
- No Name Given: The main Cuckoo/Alma's mother is only credited as 'Hooded Woman'.
- Non-Malicious Monster: The Cuckoos are dangerous, but they're ultimately just following instinct to reproduce and prey.
- Not So Stoic: König's coolly sociopathic personality falters as he has to deal with Gretchen poking around the resort and his plans, seeming genuinely annoyed by her, especially when she disregards his orders to wait at the front desk for him to pick her up early on in the film. His attempt to kill her via Vorpal Pillow is implied to be out of petty annoyance with her just as much as it is to dispose of her.
- Not Blood, Not Family: Gretchen continously reminds various characters that Beth is not her mother (or even step-mother) and Alma is not her sister. Ironically, she's correct on the last one, but that's also the point of the story where she starts seeing Alma as her sister.
- Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: König paints himself as a preservationist trying to keep the Cuckoos from the brink of extinction by luring people to his hotel resort to inseminate. However, him flaunting his authority over Gretchen and a young adolescent, and his lack of a reaction at the death of the Hooded Woman, indicates that all König cared about was controlling the Cuckoos in ways he desired.
- Obviously Evil: The film doesn't even try to portray König as being anything other than a villain. Despite seemingly coming across as being friendly and pleasant, there's something so distinctly off about him that any viewer will immediately be able to tell that he's clearly up to no good.
- Overly Long Scream: The Cuckoos can screech for a long time without stopping, as long as needed to paralyze victims and prey.
- Parasitic Horror: The story deals with predatory creatures that mimic humans known as Cuckoos, due to their habit of parasitizing human beings and having their offspring unknowingly raised by humans until they reach adolescence (similar to the bird of the same name), making them both brood parasites and endoparasites. The Cuckoos are not inherently evil, but they are extremely dangerous, commit an act similar to rape in order to reproduce, and consider humans to be prey.
- Parent with New Paramour: Part of Gretchen's tension with her father is her dislike of his new wife, Beth.
- Predation Is Natural: The Cuckoos are natural predators that look to humans to carry for offspring or as food. König figures this is just part of nature and plans to help them proliferate.
- Resentful Guardian: Luis apparently divorced Olivia, Gretchen's mother, many years ago and got his life sorted with Beth, marrying and having Alma together. Olivia died recently and nearly-adult Gretchen ends up with Luis, who clearly just wants to wait out until the girl is 18 (which will happen in mere months) and be done with it. He is portrayed as openly neglectful and playing favourites with Alma.
- Retro Universe: The film takes place sometime in the modern day, since several characters are seen owning smartphones and the mute Alma uses a text-to-speech app to communicate. But none of the cars seen in the movie are of later vintage than about 1990, and the resort uses a lot of antiquated technology, from landline phones to an old black-and-white TV, and an answering machine plays an important part in Gretchen's backstory. This all gives a sense of the resort being in a place that's beyond time and adds to its eerie atmosphere.
- Riddle for the Ages: There really is no indication where the Cuckoos came from and why they evolved to look so similar to humankind, let alone why they're almost extinct. All we know is how they reproduce and the indication of how they prey on humans.
- Romance Ensues: Gretchen wastes little time meeting Ed before the next scene shows the girls sharing a cigarette and kissing. Gretchen is even comfortable leaving the resort to live with her.
- The Runaway: Downplayed, since Gretchen is soon to be legal adult, but she still takes first chance given to run away. To complicate matters further, she's trying to run back to her mother's home, hardly seeing it as running away from a family she's clearly estranged from.
- Shout-Out:
- Multiple shout-outs to the works of Dario Argento.
- The shot of the Hooded Woman running through the woods is a reference to Suspiria (1977).
- The European alpine setting is a nod to both Suspiria and Phenomena.
- The design of König's house, particularly the room where he holds Gretchen captive, is similar to the infamous "corpse pit" in Phenomena.
- The shot of Alma's head covered in electrodes references a similar scene in Phenomena.
- The appearance of the Hooded Woman is based on the killer "Bobbi" from Dressed to Kill, and by Audrey Hepburn's outfit in Charade.
- The recurring shot of a dotted white line on the road (which later plays over the end credits) is lifted from Lost Highway, which director Tilman Singer cited as one of his favorite movies.
- The detective-turned-fanatical monster hunter Henry reads like a European version of Dr. Loomis, down to a similar trenchcoat.
- Multiple shout-outs to the works of Dario Argento.
- The Sociopath: König cares nothing for anyone but his experiments and the deaths of many people is a small price to pay for him.
- The Speechless: Alma is mute and uses a text-to-speech app to communicate with others. This is likely due to her being a Cuckoo, since none of the other Cuckoos appearing in the film show any capacity for human speech.
- Super-Scream: The Cuckoos are not shown to have any capability of speech, but can emit a deafening scream that stuns and disorients potential threats and prey, and is somehow able to create lapses in consciousness in their victims, making them unable to tell apart reality and their own imagination.
- Stealth Hi/Bye: König has a way of sneaking up on the other characters, Gretchen especially, though it's played as a joke as much it is for a scare.
- Uncertain Doom: It's implied Luis and Beth might be dead, as Gretchen is forced to escape without them, with only Alma in tow, but it's not made fully clear.
- Vorpal Pillow: König attempts to kill Gretchen with one.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Henry wishes to avenge his wife and stop the mad experiments König is up to. Unfortunately, he has no issue sacrificing Gretchen or killing little Alma for that end.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Gretchen's father and stepmother effectively disappear from the plot right before the final act. The last we see of them, the latter looks deeply sick and appears to have been drugged by the hospital staff.
- Would Hurt a Child: Henry drags Gretchen, who is still a minor, into a very dangerous investigation that could potentially get her killed, and fully intends to murder Alma because he sees her as an inhuman monster.
- Yodel Land: The story is set in a vacation resort in the Bavarian Alps, with the kitschy design of the hotel and the idyllic scenery of the surrounding mountains providing a stark contrast to the film's creepy and disturbing scenes.
- You Can Barely Stand: By the end of the story, Gretchen quite literally falls unconscious from exhaustion. She wakes up in the back of a car driven by Ed.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Dr. Bonomo and her assistant are both gunned down when König is done with his experiments - he just makes sure that the copy of all the data is at the usual spot before killing them both.
"Consider yourself lucky."