Hypocrisy, vengeance, the Black Death, and - most chilling of all -☂ a 14th-century village full of people with Shane MacGowan-type tee🅰th.

Director Alberto Sciamma's modest-but-gripping supernatural thriller never looks cheapor plays dumb in its tale of a mysterious French war hostage who seems to be implicated in the plague-y retribution that descends on his captors. Treading a fine line between occult hamminess and the underlying contention that flesh-and-blood human bein🌳gs can be just as malevolent as Dark Forces, Anazapta rarely loses its balance. It also feel💎s partly like an affectionate homage to the gothic classics of the Hammer-era horror.

Factor in the grim period detail𝕴, neat plotting and solid acting - David La Haye as the tortured stranger and horror veteran Jon Finch as the Lord of the Manor with a bloody secret - and you'༺ve got something of a nail-chewer.

And that🔥's before the Grand Guignol carnage kicks into gear...