Director: Mariano Cattaneo
Year: 2026
Country: Argentina
Alternate Titles: Nadie va a escuchar tu grito; World Cup Killer
Genre: Slasher
Plot:
Living in a small community, a group of friends trying to prepare for the upcoming World Cup celebrations are shocked to discover the community is being targeted by a savage killer during the matches and must uncover their identity to stop the madman’s rampage.
Review:
For the most part, this was a serviceable enough slasher throwback. Among the more likable factors here is the immersive atmosphere it presents, trying to use that particular time period to tell a more universal experience. Showing the way the community is gripped in the fever of the particular matches, from the community engaging in shared lockdowns and closings to prepare for everything, the constant mentions of needing to be home to watch everything, and the general wave of excitement that fuels everything taking place around them has a heart and context. That goes alongside the series of exploits between her and her friends who are trying to live their lives while the whole thing takes place, providing enough hints from the era with everyone coming together to generate the kind of immersion into that part of the era.
That leads into a solid, if somewhat problematic part of this, where the killer’s strikes serve this nicely as a series of brutal, short shock scenes, but are somewhat lacking in terms of more traditional stalking scenes. The murderers here are generally solid and brutal, with the opening attack on the victim in his house, who gets strangled with a phone cord, setting this up pretty well for the ensuing sequences, as other victims are stabbed or slashed in frenetic fashion. The big finale, where the survivors try to work out whether to trust each other as they work through the clues before dealing with the final confrontation, where it brings up some enjoyable twists and turns about the killer’s identity, which is the subject of a solid and engrossing mystery angle throughout the rest of the film.
However, while that all works incredibly well, there are some problems with the stalking scenes being an immensely underwhelming style of attack used here. This one has some really weak scenes trying to instill some suspense in the proceedings, where the noise from the games is trying to disguise the whole thing, but everything is inept and undercooked to the point where the only part that registers any kind of impression is the actual brutal kill. That reliance on the sudden burst of action to constitute the kills also means the pacing suffers somewhat, focusing more on the growing realization about who the killer might be and what his pattern of attack is, which causes this one to end up feeling overlong despite the brief running time, taking that kind of focus away from the kills to build up the storyline. These all manage to bring this one down slightly.
Overview: ***.5/5
A really solid slasher throwback without too much wrong with it, this one comes off far better than expected and manages to be quite enjoyable overall, as the few issues here do hold it back just slightly. Those with an appreciation or interest in this style of genre fare or who aren’t too bothered by the issues here will have a lot to like, while most others out there should heed caution.
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