One of the most common themes in film, to the point of being omnipresent, is that of relationships.

Film is always exploring the nature of relationships, especially that of boy meets girl.

This film stars Alison Brie and Dave Franco, who give it a meta quality as they’re a real-life couple, although you suspect that they wouldn’t like to get as close as their screen counterparts here do.

Young couple Millie (Brie) and Tim (Franco) leave the city after being a couple for ten tears and move to the country.

They do so for work, as Millie gets a job in a local school, and although the move puts pressure on Tim as a musician, he does it for his partner.

It’s not a great start for them, as on a walk near their home, they fall down a hole and get trapped their overnight.

They manage to get the out the following day, making it home fairly unscathed.

It’s not long after however that Tim finds a bond grow between them, and not in a good way.

This marks the directorial debut for Michael Shanks, which he also wrote, and is clearly inspired by the work of David Cronenberg, and can be considered almost the cinematic definition of a body horror.

It has to be said that the premise is on the vague side, having something to do with a cult’s temple that collapses into the earth. It also explores the notion of Plato’s Symposium, which the film All of You also did this year – albeit in a very different way, which has humans who were once two headed, split in half by Zeus, spend the rest of their lives searching for each other to become ‘whole’ again. It’s a little bit muddled in the framing of this film, to the point it doesn’t make much sense, but it doesn’t get in the way of things.

There’s also another string of narrative that finds Tim being haunted by his past, which again is all a bit murky, and difficult to see how it connects to the main story.

Where the film excels is in Brie and Franco becoming oh-so-intimate on screen, to the point they can’t stand being apart – literally. This is helped by some impressive CGI, which would surely get an approving thumbs up from Cronenberg.

It’s deliciously dark, with the same tone of humour to match.

It also serves as the perfect allegory for real life relationships: you need to be cautious who you get close to as they may end up being the one you’re stuck with forever.

As far as this film is concerned, Brie and Franco being an item in real life really sells the underlying concept here, and that’s of a couple who become inseparable, making it utterly absorbing and one difficult to tear yourself away from.