Last night I watched a little more than half of Sam Esmail’s Leave The World Behind (Netflix, now streaming).

As quietly creepy apocalyptic dramas go, I decided right away this is a lot better than M. Night Shyamalan’s Knock at the Cabin.

There’s no story tension to speak of, but all the spooky happenings (including the deer, the flamingoes, the smashing cars and the big tanker crashing into a beach) feel spacey and illogical and disconnected from any sort of scheme, rational or otherwise.

It’s more impressionistic (Bunuelian) than plotty, which is fine.

Mahershala Ali: “No one is in control…no one is pulling the strings…there is no going back to normal.”

I’d never seen Julia .Roberts in any sort of horror film…noteworthy.

The critics are mostly positive but Joe and Jane aren’t goin’ for it.

Barack and Michelle Obama exec produced, and my understanding is that Rumaan Alam’s 2020 source novel was inspired by Trump dystopia so you have to consider the political criticism angle.

12:45 am update: I’ve watched it to the end. Definitely a decent film.