Horror Movie Review: Behave (2024)

A dull and stupid slasher film that desperately wants to be a giallo, Behave comes from director Francesco Gabriele, and writers Dan Sproson and Georgia Viero.

The latter of those writers also stars in this film as Polly, the mother of Andrea (David Bourne) who has chaperoned him and his ‘friends’ to an isolated London villa for a getaway. A getaway that involves nothing particularly fun to do aside from await the arrival of etiquette coach and TikTok star Nancy (Stacy Thunes) who is coming to teach them in the ways of good behaviour.

What’s a group of bored young adults to do? Well, not a lot as they’re not exactly wild. The most mischief they get up to is telling a ghost story about the villa they are staying in and helping themselves to a bottle of gardener/handyman, Charles (Christian Vit) wine.

Of course, this being a slasher, they’re not alone and an unknown masked person is stalking around. Not actually doing anything, mind you, unless you count the seemingly completely unrelated intro where they may, or may not, have killed a young woman in college. Whereas, with most slashers, you get tension built up as secondary characters are killed off, Behave decides that it’s far more interesting to just watch the masked person watch the youngsters.

It’s maddening, because when actual slashing does happen, it’s a violent and bloody affair. Highly entertaining and exciting, except all of this happens in the last ten minutes. Leading to a killer reveal that is so predictable, it’s groanworthy. A mystery that few will care to see solved, especially as it just creates even more questions, before abruptly ending on a freeze frame.

Of course, it’s not about the end destination, it’s about the journey. Which is fine except this is a journey not worth having. A journey where even the most basic directions are poorly given and there is bugger all to look at, scenery wise. Behave does a horrible job of explaining why the characters are even in this scenario, it does a horrible job of explaining their relationships and why they would choose to be here, and it does a horrible job of making them appear like real people.

There’s a solid group of actors here, but no-one could make this dialogue work or handle the amount of accidental cringe-inducing scenes that exist. As a viewer you’re constantly left with second-hand embarrassment watching the awkwardness of it all. First, hoping that it will even out as it goes on, then desperately hoping that it’s going to better or at least more interesting, then finally, dreaming of the end credits just so you can say you made it to the end. It doesn’t feel like much of a reward.