Death, Desire, and the Ghostly British Countryside
There’s something about the British countryside that just begs for hauntings. Maybe it’s the fog, maybe it’s the damp stone cottages, or maybe it’s the national pastime of repressing feelings until they manifest as poltergeists. Whatever the reason, Soulmate—Axelle Carolyn’s stunning and darkly witty directorial debut—turns rural Wales into the perfect purgatory for love, loss, and the kind of romance that involves at least one dead participant.
This 2013 gothic mystery-horror doesn’t go for cheap scares or buckets of gore. Instead, it opts for something rarer: slow-burn sadness laced with dry, morbid humor and a surprisingly tender heart. It’s like The Sixth Sense if it were written by Charlotte Brontë and directed by someone with a subscription to Psychological Trauma Quarterly.
Meet Audrey: Mourning, Moody, and Mildly Morbid
Our heroine, Audrey (played with graceful melancholy by Anna Walton), is introduced in a bathtub, bleeding out and—according to the BBFC—doing it a little too convincingly. The opening suicide attempt was so realistic that British censors initially refused to classify the film at all, effectively saying, “This is too sad, please stop.” Carolyn, ever the classy provocateur, trimmed the scene, but the emotional wound remains: Audrey is a woman defined by loss.
After being saved by her sister, Audrey decides to heal the old-fashioned way—by isolating herself in a remote Welsh cottage with no Wi-Fi, no human contact, and plenty of time to stare wistfully out of windows. This is a plan that’s worked for no one in the history of haunted houses, but bless her for trying.
Anna Walton delivers a performance that’s all quiet anguish and brittle poise. You can almost smell the Earl Grey and despair. She’s not your typical horror heroine—she’s fragile, thoughtful, and intelligent, the kind of woman who reads antique letters instead of running screaming into the night.
Enter Douglas: The Perfect Gentleman (If You Like Them Dead)
Of course, no gothic retreat is complete without a mysterious locked door. Behind Audrey’s door of doom lies a room full of relics belonging to the cottage’s previous owner, Douglas (Tom Wisdom), a man who hanged himself thirty years earlier. Once Audrey opens that door, things start to go bump in the melancholic night.
Soon enough, Douglas makes himself known—not as a jump scare, but as an elegant, spectral presence who just wants to chat. He’s courteous, articulate, and hauntingly handsome, the kind of ghost you’d absolutely flirt with if you’d been alone too long. Walton and Wisdom share a chemistry that’s as eerie as it is romantic; their connection feels doomed from the start, but you can’t help rooting for them anyway.
Their conversations are intimate and oddly comforting, like Before Sunrise with paranormal overtones. As they share their grief and regrets, the boundaries between life and death start to blur. Is Douglas Audrey’s salvation, or is he just her grief wearing a waistcoat?
The Haunting as Therapy Session
Axelle Carolyn, who cut her teeth acting in Neil Marshall’s Doomsday and later proved her directing chops in Tales of Halloween, takes a refreshingly restrained approach to the supernatural. The scares are minimal but meaningful: creaks, whispers, and the quiet dread of unresolved trauma.
What makes Soulmate remarkable is that it treats haunting not as horror, but as emotional metaphor. Douglas isn’t here to terrorize Audrey—he’s here to mirror her. He’s the embodiment of everything she can’t let go of: grief, guilt, longing, and maybe a hint of repressed necrophilia (we don’t judge).
The film’s title isn’t ironic—it’s literal. Audrey finds a soulmate who truly understands her pain, and the tragic twist is that he’s from the other side. Their relationship evolves into something heartbreakingly beautiful and deeply unsettling, a romance between two broken souls who can never touch.
It’s like Ghost, if Ghost had the guts to admit that falling in love with the dead is less “romantic fantasy” and more “psychiatric emergency.”
Supporting Cast: Quirky Villagers and Emotional Ghostbusters
Because no gothic tale is complete without nosy locals, we get Theresa (Tanya Myers) and Dr. Zellaby (Nick Brimble), a married couple who oversee Audrey’s wellness retreat like they’re auditioning for Midsomer Murders. They’re helpful, kind, and deeply suspicious in that way only British villagers can be.
Zellaby’s medical advice—“maybe get some rest, don’t open haunted rooms”—goes unheeded, of course. Theresa, meanwhile, offers tea, gossip, and the subtle vibe of a woman who’s definitely keeping secrets about the previous tenant. Their understated weirdness adds a touch of dark humor to the otherwise somber proceedings.
Audrey’s sister Alex (Emma Cleasby) also pops in to provide the voice of reason—“Hey sis, maybe don’t move into a death cottage?”—before returning to London, where presumably the ghosts are too polite to haunt anyone before tea.
Ghost Story Meets Love Story (With a Dash of Existential Crisis)
What makes Soulmate so compelling is its refusal to commit fully to any one genre. It’s a ghost story, yes, but it’s also a romance, a psychological drama, and a very British meditation on grief. The film flirts with horror conventions but never cheapens its emotional core for a jump scare.
There’s humor here, too—dry, deadpan humor that sneaks up on you like a polite haunting. When Audrey starts talking to Douglas, it’s played not as madness, but as awkward courtship. You half-expect her to invite him to dinner, then remember he doesn’t eat.
Their growing intimacy is simultaneously sweet and tragic. Douglas teaches her to embrace life again, even as he reminds her that he no longer belongs to it. When the living and the dead start acting like an old married couple, you know you’re watching something special.
Axelle Carolyn: The Ghost Whisperer of British Horror
As debuts go, Carolyn’s direction is impressively confident. She balances atmosphere and empathy with the precision of someone who knows that horror is most effective when it’s about people, not just phantoms. The cinematography, all grey skies and candlelight, feels painterly and mournful—like a Romantic-era painting that accidentally became self-aware.
You can sense Carolyn’s affection for her characters, even as she tortures them emotionally. She understands that grief is the ultimate ghost—it lingers, it whispers, and it follows you home.
That she manages to infuse such darkness with sly humor (“nothing says ‘self-care’ like renting a haunted Airbnb”) makes her debut even more impressive.
The Ending: Closure, With Complications
Without spoiling the final twist, let’s just say Soulmate ends exactly as it should: quietly, heartbreakingly, and with a lingering sense of unease. There’s closure, but it’s the kind that hurts a little—the cinematic equivalent of saying goodbye to someone who still visits your dreams.
It’s not a horror ending so much as a ghostly sigh, leaving you to ponder whether love truly conquers death or just makes for really complicated afterlives.
Verdict: A Haunting Worth Holding Onto
Soulmate is a rare kind of horror film—one that whispers instead of screams, mourns instead of murders. It’s romantic without being sappy, macabre without being cruel, and haunting in both the supernatural and emotional sense.
Anna Walton and Tom Wisdom give beautifully understated performances, and Axelle Carolyn proves herself a director with both brains and a wicked sense of humor. The result is a gothic gem that lingers long after the credits roll, like the faint scent of candle smoke in an empty room.
If you’ve ever loved and lost—or just enjoy the idea of dating someone who doesn’t need to split the rent—Soulmate will speak to you. Softly. From the other side.
★★★★☆ (4 out of 5)
A melancholy ghost story with brains, heart, and a delightfully morbid grin. Soulmate makes death look romantic, grief look gothic, and isolation look like a valid lifestyle choice. Bring tissues. And maybe an exorcist.
