You Won't Be Alone (2022)
Folk horror has enjoyed something of a quiet renaissance over the past decade or so, with films trading Gothic excess for a more grounded, elemental dread rooted in landscape, superstition, and community. It is a genre that rewards patience, and one that has proved a surprisingly fertile space for debut filmmakers willing to resist the pull of convention. You Won't Be Alone (2022) arrives firmly within that tradition, transplanting its story to 19th-century Macedonia, a setting rarely seen on screen and one that lends the film an air of genuine unfamiliarity. The premise is deceptively simple: a young girl, isolated since infancy and transformed by a centuries-old witch known as Old Maid Maria, begins inhabiting the bodies of villagers one by one, experiencing what it means to be human from the inside out. It is folk horror as philosophical fable, less interested in terror for its own sake than in what the body, any body, can tell us about consciousness and belonging.
The film is the feature debut of Macedonian-Australian writer-director Goran Stolevski, produced through Causeway Films, the Australian outfit behind Jennifer Kent's The Babadook and a number of other ambitious, auteur-driven genre pieces. Stolevski had built a reputation on the short film circuit before this, but You Won't Be Alone represents a significant leap in scale and ambition. Shooting on location across North Macedonia and Serbia, the production leans hard into its environment, working with cinematographer Matthew Chuang to render the mountain villages and open countryside as something both beautiful and faintly hostile. It is worth noting that a film of this scope and visual ambition was made on a relatively modest independent budget, which makes its achievements all the more notable. For those who found similar rewards in the slow-burn rural dread of Hive, a Kosovo-set drama that also finds horror in the rhythms of isolated village life, there is clear common ground here.
The cast is spread across the film's episodic structure, with each body the witch inhabits bringing a different performer to the foreground. Sara Klimoska anchors the opening sections as Nevena, the girl at the centre of it all, conveying a feral, pre-linguistic curiosity without much dialogue to rely on. Anamaria Marinca, a Romanian actress perhaps best known to British audiences from 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, brings a weathered, unsettling weight to Old Maid Maria, the witch who sets everything in motion. Alice Englert, Félix Maritaud, and Carloto Cotta each take their turn in the rotating cast of inhabited forms, a structurally unusual demand that asks every performer to carry something of the same interior life across very different exteriors. It is a polished but occasionally uneven ensemble, and the approach is more interested in accumulation than in traditional character arcs. Fans of other films that cast strong performers in service of atmosphere over plot, including the restless naturalism on display in Fish Tank, will recognise the particular challenge and occasional frustration of that kind of filmmaking.
You Won't Be Alone (2022), written and directed by Goran Stolevski, is a striking debut that announces its ambition from the very first frame. Set in 19th-century Macedonia, this folk-horror tale follows a young girl transformed by a shapeshifting witch, embarking on a haunting journey through identity, violence, and the natural world. Visually, the film is stunning: sweeping landscapes, meticulous period detail, and a painterly use of light and shadow create an atmosphere that's both beautiful and deeply unsettling. The cinematography alone makes it worth watching, a masterclass in using environment as emotional language.
The film's greatest strength is its fresh, poetic approach to a familiar archetype. Rather than relying on jump scares or gore, Stolevski explores the witch's curse as a lens for examining consciousness, memory, and the fluidity of self. The narrative structure (episodic, reflective, almost fable-like) feels intentional and thematically rich. However, the practical effects for the witch herself are a mixed bag: while the body horror is often effective, the decision to forgo more detailed eye work (contact lenses, perhaps) occasionally breaks immersion, making some transformations feel more conceptual than visceral.
That said, the film doesn't quite sustain its powerful opening momentum. Compared to Robert Eggers' The VVitch (a film it inevitably invites comparison to) You Won't Be Alone lacks the same narrative drive and psychological claustrophobia although they feel like very similar films. The pacing meanders in the second half, and the finale, while thematically consistent, fizzles out rather than delivering a cathartic or chilling payoff. It's a film that trusts atmosphere over plot, which is admirable, but also risks leaving viewers longing for more resolution.
You Won't Be Alone is a visually gorgeous, thematically ambitious folk-horror debut that offers a fresh perspective on an old evil. It's not as tightly crafted or emotionally devastating as The VVitch, and its effects and pacing occasionally stumble, but it's still a compelling, atmospheric piece of cinema. Worth watching for its artistry and originality, even if it doesn't fully stick the landing.
You Won't Be Alone sits in an interesting position within recent folk horror: ambitious enough to earn genuine admiration, yet uneven enough to leave you wondering what a tighter hand in the edit might have produced. Stolevski is clearly a filmmaker with a distinctive sensibility, and Causeway Films have once again shown a knack for backing directors with something genuinely different to say. Whether or not the film fully satisfies, it is the kind of debut that makes you curious about what comes next, which is, in its own way, a decent enough result.
Rating: ★★★ | Year: 2022 | Watched: 2026-05-31
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for You Won't Be Alone (2022) on YouTube
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