Ella Blake (Aisling Franciosi) is an apprentice animator to her domineering mother. When her mother is hospitalised from a stroke, Ella attempts to continue her work on a stop motion animated film. She is fed story ideas by a mysterious young girl, who feeds Ella’s obsession – and starts making disturbing demands as to how she should make her film.

Russian filmmaker Władysław Starewicz was a pioneer in stop-motion animation. His films stand out, even today, due to his penchant for animating taxidermized animals rather than artificial puppets or figures. His films were exceptional but also deeply unsettling to watch. I thought about them a lot while watching Robert Morgan’s Stopmotion (2023). I also thought a lot about Roman Polanski, whose 1965 thriller Repulsion also seems to be an influence.

There seems to be a specific genre of British horror film emerging in recent years, or at least a recognisable movement. They are all low-budget, independent pictures. They are all funded in part by the British Film Institute (BFI). They seem to uniformly follow brittle young women whose psychology and personal lives unravel into hallucinations and psychosis. Taken on its own merits and there is plenty to recommend in Stopmotion. Taken in context and it cannot help but disappoint, lagging as it does behind the likes of Rose Glass’ Saint Maud and Prano Bailey-Bond’s Censor. Even non-horror films like Jessica Hausner’s Little Joe seem to share the same digital aesthetic and growing sense of unease.

There is, rather predictably, some great stop-motion animation in Morgan’s film. It is an inventive way to present the film’s wobbly descent into phantasmagoria, and the film is at its strongest when focused on Ella and the mysterious girl working together. Aisling Franciosi delivers a strong performance, much as she did in Jennifer Kent’s The Nightingale (2018), and like that film any flaws in how the character is expressed seemed based on the screenplay. Caoilinn Springall is effective as the nameless girl, although the character is inarguably just a genre staple.

The film is much less accomplished when focused on other characters. Between script and performance, they universally feel underdeveloped and under-rehearsed. While the film’s best scenes involve animation and visual effects, those moments are robbed of their power when the non-fantastical moments feel so ordinary. The result is not a great film, but instead great elements in a passable one.

Stopmotion is Morgan’s debut feature as director, and while it does not entirely hold together it does show plenty of promise. I am keen to see how his directorial career develops. Here he shows an inventive approach to media, and has a demonstrable handle on body horror in particular. As his general filmmaking skills improve, he may be a talent to watch.