15 Best Films Of 2016 (So Far)

Netflix’s move into the world of movie distribution has had mixed results so far. They started with the phenomenal Beasts Of No Nation, but that’s been tarred somewhat by the roll-out of Adam Sandler’s latests and (shudder) Special Correspondents. Thankfully Hush came along before things went too wrong to redress the balance.

On-the-face of it, Mike Flanagan (who is set to take the reins of the upcoming Halloween reboot) has made a gimmick movie - it’s a home invasion slasher where the victim is deaf - but it's actually one of the smartest takes on the genre in recent years; the "gimmick" is expansive, rather than restrictive, providing the perfect way to make a horror movie that’s aware of all the clichés, yet is never meta, smug or formulaic. It exhaustively explores every scenario you can imagine with the concept, with audio jumps aplenty, culminating in an ending only this film could have (although not before our hero plays out all the potential situations of escape in her head, making Maddie Young one of the smartest slasher victims ever).

Although pretty much every movie benefits from the cinema experience, this is one where straight home release actually accentuates the experience; all the tension, especially early on, is only helped by watching it home alone.

Was that a noise downstairs?