The shadow of The Blair Witch Project certainly looms large over any Horror movie that ventures into the woods. Be it the countless Found Footage capers set inside a dark, treacherous, vegetative coated hell on earth or the other entries in the genre that feature young people lost at nature being dispatched by something gruesome and (mostly) unseen. So doing something different with the setting is a big ask but we’ll settle for just an interesting addition to the pile and while The Ritual is flawed and not exactly original, it boasts something many of its ilk do not…strong characters.

Starting with an unexpected but thoroughly interesting narrative set-up, The Ritual immediately grabs your attention with a ruthless moment of realistic nastiness, which leads onto the plot ahead. Based on the Horror novel by Adam Nevill, the film sees four guys reunite abroad for an ‘at one with nature’ holiday,...