Harbinger — Harbinger(VOD)

Harbinger (2026) is a British occult horror directed by James Crow, with a screenplay by Simon Cluett, produced by Shogun Films and Miracle Media.

Arriving on UK digital and Blu-ray on 10 August and US digital on 11 August, the film follows Julia (Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott, Helloween), who is still haunted years after barely escaping serial killer Henry Decker (Peter Woodward, Babylon 5). Living with her mother (Carole Ann Ford, Doctor Who), she is trapped in a cycle of trauma. When paranormal TV presenter Mike Craggs (Gary Webster, Minder) offers her £50,000 to return to the house where it all happened for his ghost-hunting show, desperation wins out. But something has been waiting in that house all along. A sinister fortune-telling machine with deadly intentions.

I was immediately surprised by how good this looked. The picture quality is crystal clear, and for a moment, I thought I was settling in for a big-budget Hollywood horror.

The film wastes no time getting stuck in. Julia is frantically calling 999 when, just as she's about to tell the operator what's happening, she's struck over the head by a crazed-looking man. He ties her up, the police arrive, and he brutally kills them before turning his attention back to Julia. She has managed to escape her restraints, but not for long. He catches her, and they wrestle before he slices her like a tender bit of sirloin. Bleeding heavily, she manages to run off, but the loss of blood slows her down. He follows her, teasing her like a cat playing with a mouse, until armed response finally arrives and shoots him in the neck. Staggering back into the house, he mutters something in Latin to a sinister-looking clown with glowing red eyes before collapsing dead on the spot. Cue the opening credits. It's one hell of an opening.

Years later, Julia is trying to rebuild her life. During a job interview, flashbacks of the attack overwhelm her, forcing her to flee. Outside, she's approached by paranormal television presenter Mike Craggs, whom she very nearly tasers before he gets the chance to explain himself. He wants Julia to appear on his ghost-hunting show and revisit the house where everything happened. She tells him exactly where to go, but £50,000 is a difficult offer to ignore.

Back home, Julia talks the offer through with her mother, while the film cleverly drip-feeds more of Henry Decker's past through flashbacks. We slowly begin to understand just how disturbed he really was, without the story feeling like it's stopping to explain itself.

Once Julia agrees, everything moves at a satisfying pace. The crew prepares for the investigation, the scenes glide naturally into one another, and there is very little wasted time. It never feels like the film is padding out its runtime, a trap low-budget horror can often fall into. We get to know everyone quickly, and before long, they're standing back inside the house where Julia's nightmare began.

The suspense steadily builds as we discover Julia wasn't simply the victim of a random attack. She and Henry Decker shared a far darker history than we were first led to believe. As the team explores the house, strange events begin to pile up, the eerie clown finally makes another appearance, and everything starts to click into place. By this point, I was completely invested.

There is a brief lull while the crew prepares for Julia's interview, but even then, Crow keeps slipping little clues into the background. You know something is coming, you just have no idea what. Once the ghost hunt begins, all hell breaks loose. The body count starts climbing, the story takes a direction I wasn't expecting, and what unfolds feels like being invited inside the wonderfully twisted minds of James Crow and Simon Cluett.

The acting occasionally wobbles, but honestly, I found myself caring far more about where the story was taking me than dwelling on the performances; this feels like the kind of cult horror people stumble across years later and wonder why nobody told them about it sooner.

For me, Harbinger was an unexpected surprise. It's ambitious, unpredictable, refreshingly different, and it never quite goes where you think it will. There's gore, but there isn't just gore for gore's sake. James Crow and Simon Cluett are definitely names I'll be keeping an eye on. If this is the kind of twisted storytelling they can create together, I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next