Bleak

8 works in the index tagged BLEAK, across every medium we score — film, television, print, audio and objects.

Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima

Krzysztof Penderecki · 1960 · Record

Fifty-two strings used as an instrument of panic. Kubrick knew.

The Girl Next Door

Jack Ketchum · 1989 · Book

Based on a real case. Genuinely hard to defend recommending.

28 Days Later

Danny Boyle · 2002 · Film

Shot on video, running flat out. The soldiers are the third act.

Martyrs

Pascal Laugier · 2008 · Film

New French Extremity at its most punishing. There is no relief anywhere in it.

Deathconsciousness

Have a Nice Life · 2008 · Record

Distorted, hopeless, weirdly beautiful. Horror with no monster in it.

Kill List

Ben Wheatley · 2011 · Film

A hitman film that walks into the wrong field and never walks out.

Everywhere at the End of Time

The Caretaker · 2016 · Record

Six hours of dementia rendered as decaying ballroom loops.

Tender Is the Flesh

Agustina Bazterrica · 2017 · Book

Cannibal capitalism told flat and clean. The calm of it is the horror.