A young couple are taken by an obsequious estate agent to a viewing in a new suburban development of endless rows of identical green houses. As soon as they decide to leave, they find his car is gone and any attempt by them to drive out of the development just leads them back to the same house.
So far, so Black Mirror, but the name of the film, referring to a confined environment created for observing animals, and the opening images showing the brood parasitism of a cuckoo, meaning its method of forcing a host to raise its young, already tell us where this is heading. Sure enough, when a young boy suddenly appears in the house and grows at an unnatural rate, while perfectly mimicking everything they say, it is clear that they are not just in a suburban prison but an alien zoo of sorts.
In comparison to most current horror, science fiction or mystery films, Vivarium does manage to generate a thoroughly unsettling atmosphere without reliance on FX, action or gore. But then it is closely based on the classic Twilight Zone episode Stopover in a Quiet Town, to which it only adds the element of the couple being nothing but powerless surrogates for unseen aliens. The potential for attacking the horrifying uniformity of suburbia is also left unexplored, partly because there are no other characters in their cage to interact with. Still, marks for creating something so disquieting.
6/10
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