The vacation property’s a common setting in the world of horror. Often remote and unfamiliar to the hapless victims-to-be; a perfect playground for the stalker, psycho, or vengeful ex. With the advent of Airbnb came a wealth of fresh opportunity; an expansive foundation on which to build crawlspaces crammed with voyeurs, hidden lenses trained on the innocently unaware; enough paranoia-inducing potential to keep screenwriters and the horror-hungry happy for years. Writer and director Harry Owens shuns the fresh and familiar equally, wholly following the road less travelled with his aptly titled The Unsettling.

Abena (Zephani Idoko) and Kwame (Bambadjan Bamba) travel from Ghana to LA in an effort to heal after tragedy rips them out of the orbit of everyday existence; the loss of their daughter in a drowning accident. Abena herself seems almost deceased; hardly beginning to absorb this unexpected, incomprehensible diversion her life’s taken. She’s the epitome of shell-shocked, barely responding to Kwame’s attempts to pin some semblance of normality in place. While these could be construed as dismissive, there’s a feeling he’s sensitive to Abena’s condition at this point, so trying to be their strength. If they as a couple fall apart, what chance of clawing back any life for themselves would they have? At this stage I empathised with Kwame. To him one tragedy is horrific enough; if they lose each other they’ve lost everything.

The property, when they arrive, simply screams metaphor. It’s strikingly spartan, minimalistic, and not as clean as it first appears. There’s also what Abena initially mistakes for a window through which she swears she sees someone looking in at them. Upon discovering it’s an empty picture frame things begin to turn strange, but mainly for Abena alone. When she reports odd noises and small but eerie occurrences, Kwame’s patience and sensitivity erodes rapidly, Abena’s growing mental distress an irritation to him. When he breaks the number one rule of Things Not To Say To A Depressed Person and states it’s been almost two years, and when is she going to ‘snap out of it’, I’m not sorry to say my eyes narrowed to slits and I hissed a stream of invective through clenched teeth.

The gulf between them visibly widens, particularly when he invites their friends from the area, Vivien (Libby Munro) and Anthony, for dinner instead of the evening out Abena suggests. The accident’s the elephant in the room, deliberately skirted by the men, yet Vivien, a trauma therapist, gently balances out lighthearted small talk with subtle yet definite support, even offering her professional help. Understanding Abena’s suffering, her warm approach contrasts with Kwame’s flippancy like a slap. Drunk and mocking Vivien’s serious attempt to help Abena overcome a panic attack with hypnosis, he upsets and embarrasses them all, presenting himself as crass and uncaring, undermining Vivien’s professional status as a therapist for sufferers of mental and emotional trauma.

The entirety of The Unsettling is a visual and sensory journey through the battle with mental illness; the sufferer stalked by personal demons all too real, while the world continues as usual for everyone else; an impenetrable wall of invalidation compounding feelings of pain, fear, and isolation. This is no ordinary ghost or slasher story. It’s a brutally honest representation of the non-existence of the grieving timespan, the aching loneliness of depression, and the misunderstanding surrounding both.

There are ghosts in The Unsettling, but they’re alive and all too familiar to anyone who’s walked in Abena’s shoes. When the worst happens and we can no longer rely on our closest for support, that’s where true horror lies. And it can and does happen to normal people. People like you and I. It’s brave, powerful, and hopefully enlightening.

9 out of 10 Reality Checks