His House Parent Guide

Bol (Sope Dirisu) and Rial (Wunmi Mosaku) have finally made it to England, after escaping a civil war in South Sudan. Tragically, their daughter Nyagak (Malaika Wakolo-Abigaba) drowned on a treacherous night-time sea crossing, leaving her parents bereaved and emotionally volatile as they try to navigate a tortuous legal process to gain asylum in the United Kingdom. Even with that step successfully completed, life remains difficult for Bol and Rial. The house they are placed in by the government isn’t in ideal condition, and worse, they seem to have brought along some ghosts of their own. Despite the kind support of their caseworker, Mark (Matt Smith), the couple are in for a rough transition to their new lives, made more challenging by that strange sound coming from behind the walls…

As horror movies go, the content here is remarkably mild while still being disturbing. There is some violence, although not much – most of it takes place off-screen. There is little profanity, and what there is comes entirely from background characters. With no sexual content or drug use, His House is probably suitable for older teens who can handle the scares, and more importantly, the strong social messages.

This is one of those horror movies that has much less to do with some abstract nightmare and more to do with the brutal realities that people face in the real world. Instead of having some fanged and clawed monster looming around their home, Bol and Rial are tormented by the ghosts of their own past. There’s a legitimate question to be asked about whether any of this is real, or whether the horrors they experience are just grisly manifestations of their own traumas. Certainly some of the most disturbing parts of the movie are the flashbacks to the lives from which they tried to escape.

That deep personal focus definitely makes His House more compelling than some of the less thoughtful horror films. I think the best horror movies tend to be about something broader than just fear. In this case, the movie brings home some uncomfortable questions about the role we in the Western world have played in an ongoing humanitarian crisis, and the lasting consequences of trauma. I don’t know that you’ll find any easy answers here, but it’s worth watching all the same – unless you really want to be able to sleep soundly at night, that is.