Demián Rugna has just directed his most ambitious and ostentatious movie yet. Where Terrified made certain horrorphilia fans sit up and take notice, his follow up feature, Satanic Hispanics was a little underwhelming. When Evil Lurks ramps it back up a notch with a haunting tale grounded in native folklore. Set in a remote village, the film follows two brothers Pedro (Ezequiel Rodriguez) and Jimmy (Demián Salomon) hear gunshots in the dead of night. When dawn breaks, their investigations lead them to a corpse, severed in two and then to a home of demon possessed man. There are rules around the removal of the possessed, known as ‘rottens’ to be held by experts, but with the afore-mentioned corpse, led to be one of these ‘cleaners’ and with the local authorities dismissing the case, the brothers are asked by the landowner, to help dispose the body themselves. In doing so though, they unleash a harrowing evil that slowly consumes and infects all that come in its path.

Once this virus is exposed, Pedro and Jimmy try to round up their family with the aim to get as far away as possible. Their choices lead them down a pathway to hell, exposing all the truths and fears that they have wished to lay dormant.

As the horror unfurls, so do the dwindling hopes of survival as the main narrative centres on Pedro’s pursuits in saving his family, but in doing so, unearths his own failings with brutal and mortifying ferocity. In many ways, in life, Pedro has dug his own grave, by walking away from life’s troubles, so when he is forced to confront them, he must do say in a test of his mettle, but Director Rugna, will wring out every ounce of desperation to push his protagonist to the limit, using evil as the insipid sponge to soak it all up and feed of his weakness.

The Prognosis:

It’s possible that Rugna has delivered one of the most unexpected sleeper hits of the year, but you won’t be fooled into a false slumber as When Evil Lurks is a dark expose on the frailties of humanity. It unleashes a melee of fears from the characters involved, and ventures to the brink of despair, and in doing so asks, ‘can humankind rid themselves of past traumas, or will they be forever doomed to repeat them, embedding the emotional scars deeper and deeper?

• Saul Muerte 

When Evil Lurks is currently streaming on Shudder.