“What has four legs, then two, and then three?”
– The Riddle of the Sphynx.
Despite the machinations and designs of the rich, egocentric, and vain, each human life is finite and is designed as such. We can expand life expectancy through a balance of exercise, nutrition, medicine, and other psychologically beneficial activities, but, by and large, existence for each living person has an end date. This can, very much, be a problem when faced for the first time, whether by losing a loved one or merely coming across an animal who met some tragic end, as grappling with death means acknowledging the finite nature of one’s life. For writer/director Julia Max (Pieces of Me), her first feature film, The Surrender, is born of such a first-time experience wherein she was in close proximity to the process of dying, it raising questions of her own competency to handle the responsibility of another’s passing. Premiering during the Midnighter section of SXSW 2025, Max’s The Surrender is a tightly constructed character-driven drama that explores the fragility of life, the codependent bond of marriage, and the complexity of parent-child relationships within a disquieting horror thriller package.
When Robert (Vaughn Armstrong) succumbs to his illness, wife Barbara and daughter Megan (Kate Burton and Colby Minifie, respectively) set about to prepare for next steps. For Megan, this means contacting authorities for legal pronouncement of death, funeral home, insurance, and other immediate needs; however, for Barbara, it means culminating steps to bring Robert back. At an already volatile time, often-at-odds mother and daughter must set it aside if Barbara’s plans are to come to fruition, but there are some things that can’t be undone once done and it’ll take all they have to survive.
Max’s narrative is a simple one and, largely, keeps the production the same. The Surrender is mainly a two-hander between Burton (Big Trouble in Little China; Dumb Money) and Minifie (The Boys; i’m thinking of ending things), it’s location being the characters’ home, and the effects are more practical than generated. All three of these things generate a tangibility which becomes important the further into the story the audience goes into the supernatural. This is primarily what the focus will be so as to avoid potential spoilers.
L-R: Colby Minifie as Megan and Kate Burton as Barbara in THE SURRENDER. Photo Credit: Cailin Yatsko. Photo courtesy of SXSW.
It all begins with the believability of Barbara and Megan’s relationship and the actors’ ability to sell it. From the jump, we know that there’s tension in an already emotionally loaded situation. Moving from indoors to outdoors, Megan takes a smoke break and, upon returning, sprays herself down with something to mask the scent. This choice in the script hints that, despite being an adult, there’s something about Megan’s choices that put off Barbara, requiring Megan to feel like she needs to hide something. Combined with Minifie’s physical performance as Megan returns, the not-particularly-large-in-stature performer somehow shrinks just a little more as Barbara comes down to ask if she’s been smoking. Is the question significant as Robert is in his (we learn) last days of some kind of cancer, is a parent trying to exude control over their child, or is it merely a means of Barbara seeking control amid a flurry of uncontrollable moments? Conversely, when Megan learns of Barbara’s plans, Minifie somehow expands, bending over just enough to not appear as though Megan is towering over Barbara, her incredulity causing a loss of restraint. Burton never seems to shift her own stature as Barbara, the performer keeping the character mostly measured, except when tested by Megan, though this may be as much about maintaining secrecy until that’s no longer an option. Even then, however, Burton holds her ground against Minifie, resolute in Barbara’s convictions, even when they seem outlandish and, frankly, insane. Given the inevitability of The Surrender that Max puts forth to the audience in the opening moments, it’s important that both Minifie and Burton present characters that are stubborn and unyielding, even as they struggle to maintain what’s clearly a tenuous relationship due to the skewed perspectives they share, filtered through their relationship with Robert. Nothing in The Surrender works without these two and their respective commitment makes the film hard to look away from, even when things grow squeamish.
Overseen by production designer Tahryn Justice Smith (Fred the Super Computer), one can make guesses about where The Surrender takes place, but one can’t know for sure. What we do know is that the family is well off given the size of various rooms, the outdoor spaces for relaxation, and the decoration used to fill said spaces. In the early parts of the film, the white of the bench Megan sits on contrasted with the green of the woods that line their property provides a sense of an oasis from the reality occurring in her parents’ bedroom, Robert prone in bed between fits of pain. Later, when preparing for Barbara’s guest, only known as The Man (Neil Sandilands), the scene shifts to other parts of the house, including Robert’s office, which is wall-to-wall in a deep brown wood. Compared to the softer colors of the exterior or even the long kitchen space (decorated in steel appliances, off-white tile, and plenty of accruements to indicate a prosperous lifestyle), the office is akin to a prison, albeit a richly built one, with its closed-in feel that makes the otherwise spacious home feel constrained. This is a necessity, of course, as the narrative moves from characters who are free to move about the home and elsewhere to a need for confinement, restricted to a single space in order to complete the task for which The Man has been summoned. Tip of the hat to Max for utilizing a variety of glyphs, traditions, and languages in the ritual The Man uses as too many supernatural films fall back on Judaic or Christian tropes, sometimes doing so to the point of failing to understand what the actual traditions are within those communities and therefore blow a hole in the suspension of disbelief. According to the press notes for The Surrender, Max utilized an occult consultant, Kevin Wetmore, to help with the language used (with a few changes for “safety,” she notes) and that comes through in the believability of the ritual design and its use within the space. This thoughtfulness helps bring the audience in via the familiarity, yet are kept at a distance through the often-uncomfortable use. Of course, some of this is due to Max’s script which sets up a presumption, creating disquiet and unease, only to reveal something else, offering a lovely tension-release in the process.
Last, of course, are the effects and their creative execution. Now, Max opens the film with squelches and a decidedly gross scene, but it sets the stage for what’s to come without fully spoiling expectations. In that scene, we see an unknown figure, actively rotted in several places as hands reach out through the back to separate the skin where the spine should be: unnatural, inhuman, gross. With it occurring in the opening, it’s the safest thing to identify without teeing up what occurs later, but, suffice it to say that blood doth flow, but the intention is as meaningful within the metaphor of the film as it is designed smartly to invoke reality within the hyperreality of the narrative. Close-ups are provided and the actors sell the fiction marvelously, but be advised that there’s no joy here. No satisfaction, only introspection and sacrifice. While some VFX was used to gussy up the carnage, the focus on prosthetics, makeup, and other blood/body gags only serves to ground the film, enhancing Max’s intention along the way.
As someone who now has begun irregular “death checks” on their mother after a health scare months ago (because Jews tend to favor gallows humor in the face of scary truths), there’s a profound truth to Max’s The Surrender and it all begins with its title. To surrender is to give way to someone or something else’s authority. In the passage of life, for those who take part in the being born, growing up, and then dying portions of existence, there comes a point where the responsibility of your life is handed off to someone else. You can make all the plans who want, but, in the scope of circle of concern/circle of control, we individuals largely have no control over when it’s our time and whether or not we’ll need someone’s help before. As Barbara and Megan poured over a tight schedule of medicine for Robert, so now does the responsibility of determining the needs of my currently-abled mother fall upon myself and older siblings. Decisions need to be made and potentially uncomfortable conversations need to be had because the ultimate surrender is coming. In this way, Max’s film is quite poignant, even if it doesn’t dig into Megan’s complex relationship with her parents enough to feel fulfilling and the ending is nothing short of interpretive, but neither of these things shatter the tight weave constructed by the performances, production design, and practical effects. Give yourself up to The Surrender and allow yourself the chance to ponder the uncomfortable inevitability of the end.
Screening during SXSW 2025.
Available on Shudder May 23rd, 2025.
For more information, head to the official SXSW The Surrender webpage.
Final Score: 4 out of 5.
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Categories: In Theaters, Reviews
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