The Ritual on Netflix is a solid freaking monster movie. Holy hell.

In short, the film is about a group of friends who reunite to go on a hiking trip and come across something horrifying. In long, this film is about a group of friends who reunite to go on a hiking trip and come across something horrifying and KEEP ME IN A STATE OF ANXIETY THE ENTIRE TIME.

Really, though, the pacing in this film is perfect. The acting is good, and the story is solid. It does have a bit of a Blair Witch vibe, at first, but that soon disappears and it becomes something all its own.

I feel like it’s rare to come across a good monster movie these days, outside of the Cloverfield films, of course. The Ritual does a very good job at building up this creature and keeping it obscured from our vision until the very end. I will say that the ending to the film is not as strong as it maybe could be, mainly in regards to how one of the characters is trying to get out of the situation that he is in (there are no spoilers there, right? I tried really hard to construct that sentence without giving anything away.)

This film is one that, I think, is best to go into without really knowing a whole lot about it. I had googled “best horror films on Netflix right now” and this was one that was on a list. I read a little bit about it and that was it. I knew it was a monster movie and I knew that it was about a group of friends going on a trip that soon goes horribly wrong. And, honestly, I’m happy that’s all I knew. That shit was intense.

Anyway, it’s a solid horror film. Highly recommend it.

Currently streaming on Netflix. Duh.