Under the Shadow marks the directorial and writing debut of Iranian-born Babak Anvari. Having screened at film festivals in mid-2016 (the film notably won best film prize at the Neuchâtel International Fantastic Film Festival), Under the Shadow opened in select theaters and on VOD on October 7. Netflix has acquired the rights to the film, so it will eventually be even more widely available. And that’s a very good thing because Under the Shadow is one of the best independent horror films released in the last few years—in the company of The Babadook (Jennifer Kent, 2014), It Follows (David Robert Mitchell, 2014), and The Invitation (Karyn Kusama, 2015).
