Maika Monroe is unrecognizable in Zachary Wigon’s Victorian Psycho, a horror-cum-comedy esque nightmare written by Virginia Feito based on her novel of the same name. The premise is certainly simple enough, and yet this latest addition to the horror panorama is effective if inexplicably strange, a fresco of insanity with camera work so detailed it feels like the twists and turns of entrails.
After a series of failed governess jobs, Winifred Notty (Monroe) arrives at the remote Ensor house with the intention of succeeding once and for all as a trusted member of the household. She is to teach the children of the house, the dim-witted, boisterous Andrew (Jacobi Jupe) and the slightly peculiar Drusilla (Evie Templeton), whose education is not of much concern to her parents, the suave Mr Pounds (Jason Isaacs) and the unlikable Mrs Pounds (Ruth Wilson). As Winifred settles in however, strange happenings and disappearances occur, and the family begin to suspect that this new governess isn’t all she seems.
As a modern scream queen, it is thoroughly refreshing to see Monroe as villain rather than damsel in distress or detective – her ability to contort her face and make herself virtually indistinguishable to the previous frame is unparalleled, a strange sort of female Jim Carrey were he of the horror persuasion. Paired with Nico Aguilar’s use of crooked shots and sudden cuts, there is something truly novel at play here, the first scene cementing Victorian Psycho as something garishly good – face and camera are at just the right angle to make Winifred look particularly haunted, before straightening up in one swift movement, as though it were just an illusion, a trick of the eye. Her supporting cast similarly excel, all perfectly handpicked – Thomasin McKenzie, another resident scream queen, plays the giggly nurse Ms Lamb, while Jupe and Templeton are perfect as the wide-eyed Pounds children, he heir to the estate and obsessed with the riches of pineapples, she the black sheep of the family. Isaacs meanwhile plays charm bordering on creepiness with relish, sweating out his attraction to the new governess for all his worth. The character of Mrs Pounds is perhaps a little lacklustre at times, but Wilson nonetheless delivers extreme dislike with vigour. It’s certainly nothing new in terms of storyline, and the latter half, including Winifred’s inevitable reason for showing up at the Pounds house, feels a little dragged out at best, at worst a development that could have benefited from a little more context – nevertheless, the tone employed and atmosphere established, a mixture of paranormal, horror and comedy, is one genuinely not explored enough as of yet, and Wigon gets the absolute best out of his actors, establishing himself as an interesting new voice in horror.
