When a Haunted Pub Has More Drafts Than the Script
Every once in a while, a horror movie comes along that makes you wonder if the real curse was placed on the editing room. Baghead is that movie. Directed by Alberto Corredor, this 2023 supernatural thriller promises ghosts, grief, and generational curses—but delivers something closer to a drunken séance where everyone forgot their lines halfway through.
The premise sounds deliciously eerie: a young woman inherits her estranged father’s pub, only to discover a burlap-sack-wearing entity in the basement that can resurrect the dead for two minutes… at a cost. Sounds like The Conjuring meets Cheers, right? Sadly, what we actually get is The Conjuring: Pub Edition, directed by someone who thinks “slow burn” means “please fall asleep.”
The Plot (Bring a Map, You’ll Need It)
The movie starts with Owen (Peter Mullan), a grizzled Scottish pub owner in Berlin (because why not), setting himself on fire after recording a cryptic message for whoever inherits the place. It’s a strong start—there’s a dead dad, a creepy tape, and the faint whiff of promise. Unfortunately, the fire was the last spark this film had.
Enter Iris (Freya Allan, aka Ciri from The Witcher), Owen’s daughter, who’s come to identify the body and, for reasons that defy all logic, stay in the creepy pub overnight. Because when your estranged father dies in mysterious circumstances and leaves you a haunted building, you definitely don’t check into a hotel.
Soon enough, Iris meets Neil (Jeremy Irvine), a walking red flag who offers her cash to “see the woman in the basement.” Instead of calling the police—or at least Googling “what’s in my dead dad’s cellar”—Iris agrees. That’s the moment you realize this film is less about terror and more about terrible decision-making.
In the basement lives Baghead, a humanoid figure with a potato sack over her head and a surprisingly generous ghost-customer service policy: two minutes to chat with your dearly departed before she tries to murder you. Think of her as the supernatural version of a sketchy Wi-Fi connection—she’ll let you reconnect briefly, but you’ll regret it when it crashes and eats your soul.
When the Ghost Story Becomes a Pub Crawl
The film lurches from scene to scene like a drunk tourist stumbling through Berlin. Every revelation feels like it’s been photocopied from a better movie: there’s a curse, a secret society, a tragic backstory about a witch burned at the stake, and of course, the one rule that no one ever follows.
Iris, naturally, ignores all warnings and starts running Baghead sessions like a séance side hustle. People show up, hand over their loved ones’ trinkets, and cry for two minutes before someone inevitably screams. The jump scares are so predictable you could set your watch to them—Baghead pops up, shrieks, the soundtrack assaults your ears, and you yawn your way back into mild consciousness.
By the halfway point, the story begins to spiral into pure nonsense. There’s a solicitor who may or may not be a ghost, a cult from 400 years ago, and a backstory involving alien corridors under the pub. You half expect the Scooby-Doo gang to show up and rip off Baghead’s mask. (“Jinkies, it was capitalism all along!”)
Characters Who Desperately Need Better Agents
Freya Allan is a talented actress. She’s proven that in The Witcher. But here, she’s stranded in a script that treats her like a confused tour guide to Hell. Her Iris is equal parts plucky and clueless—too rational to believe in ghosts, yet too irrational to move out of the building where people keep dying. Her emotional range oscillates between “mildly alarmed” and “sweaty confusion.”
Jeremy Irvine plays Neil, the guy who just screams “don’t trust me.” He’s that character every horror movie has—the one whose first appearance makes you go, “Yep, he’s definitely stabbing someone by the third act.” And indeed, he does.
Peter Mullan, as Iris’s father, tries his best to add gravitas to this circus, but he’s out of the movie before the popcorn cools. The remaining cast exists mainly to explain the lore and then die from it. Ruby Barker (as Iris’s friend Katie) gets the thankless “skeptical bestie” role—she investigates the curse, gets too close, and ends up as proof that curiosity kills the supporting character.
The Baghead Itself: Not So Much “Scary” as “Fashion-Forward”
Baghead, the titular ghost, should’ve been terrifying. The idea of a shape-shifting entity who wears a sack and channels the dead has potential. But instead of fear, you feel pity—she looks like she raided the prop closet of The Village and got lost on her way to a Slipknot concert.
Every time she appears, you expect something horrifying. Instead, you get two minutes of wobbly CGI, followed by dialogue that sounds like it was written by a séance enthusiast with Wi-Fi lag:
“Do you… miss me?”
“Yes… but also… I am evil now.”
That’s not haunting—it’s like chatting with a haunted Alexa.
Horror Without Heart (or Head)
The movie’s biggest problem is that it never decides what kind of horror story it wants to be. Is it supernatural dread? A family tragedy? A ghostly morality play about grief? The answer appears to be “all of the above, but none of them well.”
The tone wobbles between grim seriousness and unintentional comedy. At one point, Iris watches a VHS tape of her father warning her not to mess with Baghead. Two scenes later, she’s scheduling séances like it’s a customer loyalty program. “Two minutes for €2000, no refunds if Baghead eats your soul!”
There’s a kind of bleak humor in how seriously the movie takes itself. Every line of exposition lands with the weight of a Sunday sermon, but the logic is so porous you could drive a beer truck through it. Baghead is “unkillable,” except when fire works. The curse passes through the deed to the pub, but signatures fade if the plot needs them to. Even gravity seems negotiable—characters fall from rooftops, bleed a bit, and get up like they’ve spilled coffee, not internal organs.
Visually Impressive, Emotionally Hollow
To give credit where it’s due, Baghead looks great. The cinematography is slick, all amber light and creeping shadows. The pub feels genuinely haunted—its peeling walls and flickering bulbs whisper, “Something terrible happened here.” Unfortunately, the only terrible thing that actually happens is the script.
The film mistakes good lighting for good storytelling. Every shot looks like it’s begging to be in a trailer, but the scenes themselves have no rhythm or momentum. The editing is so uneven that even Baghead herself seems confused about when she’s supposed to appear.
The Climax: Or, How to Trip Over Your Own Lore
The final act turns into a full-on battle of nonsense. Neil tries to take ownership of the pub by murdering Iris, Baghead pretends to be Iris, and then, somehow, Baghead wins. The pub burns down, and the cursed entity walks free into the sunlight like a girlboss emerging from a haunted LinkedIn conference.
The ending tries to be profound—“Evil cannot be contained,” or something like that—but it mostly feels like the movie just gave up. You half expect the credits to roll over Baghead getting coffee and scrolling through Airbnb listings for her next haunting.
Final Verdict: Leave a Yelp Review, Then Run
Baghead wants to be about grief, guilt, and the dangerous temptation of the past. What it actually delivers is a haunted-house movie about bad business decisions and a ghost who’d rather monologue than murder.
There’s a great short film buried in here somewhere (and, in fact, there was—Alberto Corredor’s 2017 short Baghead was acclaimed). Unfortunately, the feature-length version is like a beer left out overnight: flat, tepid, and vaguely sad.
Rating: 3/10 — A slow, soggy séance that mistakes confusion for depth. Baghead may speak to the dead, but she couldn’t scare the living if she tried.
