Leviticus review: The Australian horror film that's about to conquer the world
This could be Australia’s first Best Picture Oscar nom since 1995
Note: This review was originally written (but not published) for nine.com.au
There’s a moment near the end of Australian horror film Leviticus when a Frank Ocean song hits and something quietly shifts. The scares are done. The love story has broken your heart. And then this song comes on, titled Self Control, and you realise that you’ve just watched something genuinely special.
Leviticus announces itself as a horror movie, and it absolutely delivers. It’s creepy and scary. But it’s also a film that stays with you long after the lights come back on. It’s more than a film with a demon in it, it’s a love story. And that, more than any jump scare or clever concept, is why this movie is about to become a very big deal.
Aussie horror just got it’s next heavyweight
First time director Adrian Chairella’s debut feature spared a bidding war at the Sundance Film Festival before being snapped up by NEON, the independent film distributor that brought Parasite and Anora to global audiences. Both Parasite and Anora also won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2019 and 2024 respectively.
Leviticus arrives at an interesting moment for the Horror genre. Small-budget horror is having its best box-office moment in decades. Backrooms, shot for under a million dollars, just earned $200 million globally. Obsession, still enjoying a run in cinemas, was made for $750,000 and has already hit $294.2 million globally.
Leviticus is produced by Causeway Films, the Australian company behind The Babadook, Talk to Me and Bring Her Back, and has all the ingredients for the same global success. But what separates Leviticus from being just another micro-budget genre success is that Chiarella is making a film about something. Something personal. Something that matters.
What’s Leviticus about?
Seventeen-year-old Naim (Joe Bird) has just moved to a new town with his mother (Mia Wasikowska) and quickly falls for Ryan (Stacy Clausen), his lanky, soft-spoken classmate. Their first kiss comes with an unspoken agreement: keep it secret, because in this tightly-wound religious community, secrets like theirs have consequences.
When things unravel and both boys are subjected to a conversion therapy ritual by a visiting Deliverance Preacher (Nicholas Hope), turning their trauma into a monster. An entity that takes the shape of whoever they desire most; that is, each other. A creature born entirely from the hatred surrounding them.
The performances are extraordinarily spectacular
Joe Bird, who you might recognise from Talk to Me, plays Naim perfectly nervous, tender and completely believable, you’re invested in him within minutes. MiaWasikowska, who also served as executive producer, brings a quietly unsettling stillness to the role of Niam’s mother. But it’s Stacy Clausen who is the film’s secret weapon. Playing both the real Ryan and the demon that haunts Naim, he generates a skin-crawling duality. Every time he appeared on screen in the film’s second half, I held my breath.
The film’s most disturbing sequence involves no supernatural element whatsoever, just a car park, a group of adults, and the banal, ordinary face of homophobia.
That’s also why the film works so well for audiences beyond horror fans. The central fear isn’t supernatural at all, it’s the very human terror of being betrayed by the people supposed to love you most. The monster is the metaphor. The love story carries the film.
Leviticus is a triumph: a horror film with a genuinely original monster and a love story with enough emotional weight to wreck you completely. It’s scary, it’s smart, and it has something to say. Australia’s horror streak continues.
Leviticus is in cinemas.