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In recent years, scary movies has frequently explored toxic romance with the same intensity as a cursed dating app. From manipulated meet-cutes (New; Companion) to long-term codependence (Together) to the rare happy ending (Love-Struck), it's evident that romantic relationships are primarily gory nightmares, and a pair venturing to a isolated spot together signifies a new level of fright.

So it's not surprising when Liz (Tatiana Maslany) begins to feel uncomfortable on her weekend away with Malcolm (Rossif Sutherland) at the beginning in the new and much-concealed scary film Keeper. Liz and Malcolm have been together for about a year, which we discover early on has marked the period Liz has fled past relationships. Still, she appears hopeful about this one. She thinks she understands Malcolm pretty well, and their early scenes together are not as filled with red flags nor as suspiciously idyllic as other recent figures in the doomed-couple genre. Liz has a cautious, dry sense of humor, and Malcolm has a slightly mumbled way of speaking as he explains some oddities about his ancestral cabin in the woods (like the fact that he has a creepy relative who lives close by). But their awkwardness levels are complementary. They seem at ease together.

The director brings in discord through his shot choices, instead of subtle hostilities or past events.

Liz and Malcolm's expressions are rarely outright hidden, but they're frequently partially obscured, viewed from strange perspectives, or framed in scenes with a disconcerting amount of headroom. This establishes a pattern of disorientation that persists as Liz thinks she perceives soft noises through the house's air ducts. When she relaxes in the house's luxurious bath, there's an intensely unforgettable overlay of the adjacent stream rushing all around her, as if she's about to go beyond space and time. "I feel like I took mushrooms," she tells a companion she phones when she's by herself at the lodge. Her acquaintance inquires if she actually took psychedelics; Liz doesn't answer directly.

For a while, Keeper – named for Liz's supposed status as the woman in Malcolm's world – appears like it could head in multiple paths, its horror elements mixed together in a dreamlike mix. Is it a ghost story, a forest killer movie, or just a really bad experience? Perkins, a horror specialist who has been on a productive streak for the last year and a half with an additional film due out next year, makes it difficult to discern, both in-movie (so many of the creepiest initial scenes are instances just blurry or in the corner of the eye) and extra-textually; his last two films were the tonally distinct serial-killer freakout Longlegs and the Final Destination-ish scary humor The Monkey. This eclecticism, combined with Keeper's elusive and spoiler-averse ad campaign, could cause the latest release seem to some like a shell game intended to embellish what is, at its core, a pretty simple horror story.

Perhaps it's that. But one aspect of what renders Perkins' film so refreshing is the way it prioritizes its visceral effect on an viewer over a desire to twist that plot into a modern relationship parable. As clever as so many current horror movies are, they frequently write for theme instead of shooting for immediacy. As a result, some are starved for original imagery, unexpected juxtapositions or a feeling of genuine, strange enigma. Keeper possesses each of these, and Perkins understands just how far to advance those components without allowing the movie to become vague woo-woo self-indulgence.

He also seems to know what a powerful stabilizing force he has in Maslany, who isn't called upon to perform the typical masterful demo reel of a female on the brink of doom. Liz does get freaked out by the weird occurrences that take place around her, and the character is written and performed with a certain directness. (She's not one of those scary movie leads who mysteriously avoids asking what the hell is happening.) Yet Maslany provides a additional layer to her performance in her unguarded times: a cynical flick of her gaze in one way or another, the fragility of her more courteous smiles, the abbreviated of both her closeness and quickness to irritation with her unseen pal on the call. Though no specific skeleton key to her traumatic history is revealed, the figure still feels complete.

The same applies of the film as a whole, too. It's not as rich as Sinners nor as narratively ambitious as Weapons, two of 2025's leading examples for innovative horror. But when Keeper concludes, its compact structure seem satisfying, correct and improbable to generate a sequel. That tidiness drives home some of its themes in a manner that the more obvious messaging of other romantic nightmare stories don't always manage: perhaps it requires a mythical horror for the complicated affair of relationships to remain so neatly kept.

• Keeper debuts in cinemas on November 14th.