Adam Scott Checks Into a Cursed Irish Inn: “Hokum” Review and Haunted Hotel Breakdown
“Hokum” Review: Adam Scott Checks Into a Cursed Irish Inn
Adam Scott’s latest genre outing, Hokum, strands an American novelist in a creaky Irish country hotel where the honeymoon suite comes with a resident witch, the staff seem one spell away from a labor dispute, and a forest-dwelling eccentric chugs magic mushroom potion like it’s vitamin water. It’s a knowingly pulpy setup that leans into the title’s promise of trickery and B‑movie fun, even if the final result never quite becomes the next great Irish haunted-hotel horror.
Haunted Hotels, Irish Folk Horror, and Damian McCarthy’s Niche
Written and directed by Irish filmmaker Damian McCarthy, Hokum arrives in a horror landscape already crowded with cursed Airbnbs, evil timeshares, and boutique hotels where the complimentary item is usually a demon. What sets this one apart on paper is its blend of Irish folk horror with a slightly meta, writer‑in‑peril premise and the casting of Adam Scott, who has spent the last decade bouncing between cringe comedy (Parks and Recreation), prestige weirdness (Severance), and horror‑adjacent projects.
McCarthy’s previous work has shown a fondness for confined spaces and slow‑burn dread, and Hokum fits neatly into that tradition. The film trades on the visual mythology of the “enchanted Irish woodland”—a space already mythologized by everything from The Hallow to The Hole in the Ground—and then undercuts it by initially opening in the desert, a disorienting choice that the film only partially earns.
Plot Setup: A Novelist, a Witch, and a Very Questionable Honeymoon Suite
Scott plays an American novelist looking for inspiration (and possibly escape) who checks into a remote Irish hotel that feels one renovation away from being a murder podcast. The inn’s shabby charm comes with an ominous warning: don’t worry about the witch in the honeymoon suite, she’s… contained. Meanwhile, the staff seem to be hiding more than just poor TripAdvisor reviews, and a local forest hermit guzzling psychedelic mushroom brew adds a folk‑magic wrinkle to the classic haunted‑hotel template.
McCarthy uses this setup to toy with the idea of “hokum” itself: superstition as performance, horror as something people package and sell. The inn thrives on its spooky reputation, turning real danger into a tourist gimmick. The question becomes whether the witch and the woods are truly malevolent or just props in an elaborate con—at least until bodies and boundaries begin to blur.
“There may be no more fertile ground for screen horror than the enchanted woodlands of the Emerald Isle, which makes it disconcerting when Hokum opens with a desert…”
That desert opening becomes emblematic of the film’s overall tension: a director with a clear sense of mood occasionally undercut by choices that feel clever in theory but distancing in practice.
Adam Scott’s Performance: From Deadpan to Dead‑Scared
Scott’s casting is the film’s biggest commercial hook, and he mostly delivers. He leans into his now‑familiar persona: neurotic, slightly smug, but capable of pivoting into genuine vulnerability. That works nicely for a character who writes about fear for a living, then finds himself trapped in a scenario he’d normally mine for plot twists.
What may frustrate some horror fans is that the script never fully weaponizes Scott’s comedic instincts. The film flirts with horror‑comedy and meta‑commentary without committing, which can leave his performance suspended between tones—less unhinged than it could be, less grounded than it maybe should be.
Direction, Atmosphere, and Folk‑Horror Craft
Where Hokum fares best is in its sense of place. Once the film leaves the desert misdirect behind, the mise‑en‑scène settles into damp corridors, crooked door frames, and forest paths that feel both inviting and faintly predatory. McCarthy clearly understands how much horror lives in textures and sounds: the scrape of an unseen presence, the thrum of the wind against old windows, the creak that might be the building or might be something else entirely.
The folk elements—the witch, the mushroom‑potion eccentric, whispered rituals—tap into Irish horror’s current fixation on the cost of tampering with old belief systems. Yet the film sometimes feels like it’s ticking off folk‑horror boxes rather than plumbing their cultural roots. You get the iconography of curses and sacred woods without the full weight of historical or local specificity that powered, say, The Witch or November in their own contexts.
“Hokum feels like a filmmaker having fun with the idea of horror as a long con, but the film’s most effective moments are the ones where it stops winking and simply lets the shadows do the talking.”
Where “Hokum” Works: Mood, Location, and Genre Playfulness
- Moody Visuals: The contrast between the stark opening and the lush, shadowy inn gives the film a strong visual arc, even when the storytelling stumbles.
- Playful Genre Awareness: The script knows the haunted‑hotel rulebook and has fun rearranging it, especially in the early going when the protagonist is skeptical and slightly jaded.
- Adam Scott’s Presence: His mix of vulnerability and wry detachment makes the first half engaging, even when the scares are still winding up.
- Sound and Space: McCarthy uses narrow hallways, locked doors, and distant noises to quietly ratchet up anxiety instead of leaning only on jump scares.
Where “Hokum” Falters: Pacing, Payoff, and Thematic Follow‑Through
For all its charm and craft, Hokum struggles with momentum. The desert prologue tees up a mystery that takes too long to meaningfully sync with the inn storyline, and by the time everything converges, the film has lost some of the eerie stillness that made its middle stretch engaging.
Thematically, too, there are intriguing threads—about how horror is commodified, how artists exploit trauma, how belief can be both shield and weapon—that never fully cohere. The witch is a prime example: more symbol than character, she’s a potent image whose narrative function remains oddly limited, especially by the standards of modern folk horror which tends to reframe “monsters” with more nuance.
- Inconsistent Tone: The film oscillates between straight folk horror and self‑aware genre riff, which can blunt both scares and satire.
- Underused Supporting Characters: The shady hotel staff and forest eccentric feel like they belong in a richer ensemble piece than the runtime allows.
- Third‑Act Blur: As visuals ramp up, motivations grow fuzzier, and the emotional stakes never quite crystallize.
Where “Hokum” Fits in Contemporary Horror
Within the broader horror ecosystem, Hokum is a mid‑tier entry: atmospheric enough to please fans of slow‑burn supernatural tales, but too structurally messy to break out in the way something like Talk to Me or Hereditary did. Its Irish setting and folk‑magic flourishes give it a niche appeal that will likely land well on streaming, where horror audiences are increasingly drawn to regionally specific, lower‑budget chillers.
It also continues a trend of casting recognizable TV faces in smaller, stylish horror vehicles—a path that’s worked well for performers from Elisabeth Moss to Wyatt Russell. For Adam Scott, Hokum reinforces his usefulness as a genre anchor: believable as a skeptic, compelling as a man coming apart, and just wry enough to keep the film from feeling dour.
Verdict: A Watchable, If Uneven, Stay at the Scariest Inn in Ireland
Hokum lives up to its title in both affectionate and slightly damning ways. It’s a competent, occasionally inspired slice of Irish folk horror with a starry lead and a playful relationship to genre tropes, but it rarely digs deep enough—emotionally, thematically, or mythologically—to feel essential. As a late‑night streaming choice, it’s an atmospheric, somewhat disposable stay at a haunted inn you’ll be glad to check out of by morning.
Review by Guest Entertainment Critic
Rating: 2.5/5
If you’re a fan of Adam Scott, Irish horror, or the haunted‑hotel subgenre in general, Hokum is worth a look—just temper expectations. For Damian McCarthy, though, it feels less like a destination and more like a promising, if bumpy, stopover on the way to something sharper and stranger.
