Goodnight Mommy

Horror wimps, don’t go anywhere near this nerve-jangling Austrian arthouse thriller. There are unwatchably unpleasant scenes here that feel like having vinegar poured into a paper cut (its directors say that two people have fainted watching its nasty bits). What makes the look-away-now scenes unbearable is that this stuff could happen – it’s not splatty gore or characters getting faces eaten off by zombies.

It opens with a woman arriving home from hospital after plastic surgery, her face wrapped creepily in bandages. Her ten-year-old twin sons are freaked out by her changed appearance and odd behaviour – why is she cruelly ignoring one brother? Is this woman really their mum? ‘Goodnight Mommy’ is icily effective and Michael Haneke fans will find a lot to like here, even if it doesn’t run as deep as ‘Funny Games’.