FOR REFUGEES IN ESSEX, THE ONLY WAY IS TERRIFYING!

WHILE Halloween may be a little muted this year, it is screeching and wailing as loudly as ever on screen. The Netflix release His House builds a horror story out of the predicament of two South Sudanese refugees who set up home on a grim Essex council estate.

Matt Smith, light years from his stint as the young Prince Philip in The Crown, plays a social worker who introduces Bol (Sope Dirisu) and Rial (Wunmi Mosaku, both pictured right) to their new lodgings with the ironic words: ‘Amazing, innit? It’s a palace.’

Alas, it is anything but. And to make matters much, much worse, its walls seem to be inhabited by a malevolent witch who has followed them from Africa.

The feature debut of short-film maker Remi Weekes, His House is not without flaws. But it is atmospheric, has unexpected twists and neatly incorporates racism in the plot, like a cut-price Get Out.

RELIC is another first-time feature, by Australian director Natalie Erika James, and is co-produced by Jake Gyllenhaal. Like His House it spins horror and dread out of a commonplace situation, in this case dealing with an elderly relative with dementia. Emily Mortimer (making a very convincing Aussie) is excellent as Kay, whose mother Edna (Robyn Nevin) seems to have gone walkabout from her secluded home. When she turns up, Kay and her daughter Sam (Bella Heathcote) think the nightmare is over. Naturally, it is only just beginning.

SHIRLEY, directed by Josephine Decker, is not a horror film. Rather, it’s a compelling 1950s-set drama about a real-life American horror writer, Shirley Jackson, played quite brilliantly by Elisabeth Moss as a difficult, volatile agoraphobic.

In her fiery relationship with her academic husband Stanley (Michael Stuhlbarg, also terrific) there are strong echoes of Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf, but it’s her growing influence over Rose (Odessa Young), a young woman married to Stanley’s university protégé, that gives the story powerful momentum. His House (15, Netflix) Verdict: Wall-to-wall chills ★★★II Relic (15, cinemas) Verdict: Scares Down Under ★★★II Shirley (15, cinemas) Verdict: Superbly acted biopic ★★★★I