Hokum (2026), Our Land (2026), Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2011)

Indie Film Weekly
Episode 72: Hokum (2026), Our Land (2026), Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2011)

Glen Reynolds spotlights several new and engaging independent films playing in theaters, available for purchase or rental, or on a streaming platform. He also shares a classic movie from his favorites which you'll want to revisit or see for the first time.

Additional movies mentioned in this episode include:
The Last One for the Road (2026)
Janet Planet (2024)

Recorded: 04-17-26
Studio: Just Curious Media
Companies: Circus Road Films & Indie Igniter

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Host:
Glen Reynolds

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Just Curious Media - https://www.JustCuriousMedia.com/

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Transcript

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Welcome back to Indie Film Weekly for the week of May 1st, 2026. I'm your host, Glenn Reynolds. This week in theaters, we have a supernatural horror film set in a remote Irish inn where grief turns into something that won't stay in the past. We have a documentary that digs into a land dispute and the killing of an indigenous community leader, and then follows the long fight to get the case heard. And we have an Italian road movie where two hard-drinking friends pull a shy architecture student into a bender that becomes a strange kind of mentorship. Indie films do not get endless chances in theaters. If you want the bold stuff to keep getting booked, you have to vote with your Friday night. On demand, I'm spotlighting a 1991 summer story in rural Massachusetts about an 11-year-old and her complicated magnetic mom. And for our classic, we're going underground with a 3D documentary that puts you face to face with the oldest paintings most humans will ever see. This episode of Indy Film Weekly is brought to you by Circus Road Films, helping independent filmmakers find their audience since 2006. Learn more at CircusRodefilms.com. Let's dive in. Our first Indy film in theaters this week is Hokum. Directed by Damian McCarthy, it follows Ome Bowman, a reclusive horror novelist, who travels to a remote Irish inn to scatter his parents' ashes. He's there to grieve and disappear. The staff greets him with stories about a witch said to haunt the honeymoon suite. Ohm listens like a writer, looking for texture. Then the inn starts pushing back. The film plays on the way superstition can wedge itself into a tired mind, especially when you are alone in a strange place and carrying old pain. Ohm's nights fill with disturbing visions that feel personal, like the building is reading him. When something goes missing, the story tightens into a situation where he has to act, not just observe. Adam Scott is a great fit for this kind of slow dread because he can project normalcy while clearly unraveling. McCarthy keeps the setting focused, so the end becomes its own little universe. You start tracking the staff, the rooms, the hallways, and the little patterns that repeat. The hook is not just a haunting. It's the idea that grief has a shape, and the wrong place can give it teeth. The film premiered at South by Southwest, and it's built for audiences who like horror with atmosphere and psychology, not just noise. Our second indie film in theaters this week is Our Land. Directed by Lucretia Martel, this documentary follows a real case that begins in 2009 when armed men attempt to evict members of the indigenous community of Chaschagasta in northern Argentina. During the confrontation, the community leader Javier Chocobar is shot and killed. The murder is recorded on video, which makes the cruelty plain and the denials harder to sell. And yet the story doesn't move quickly because this is also a film about delay as a weapon. Martel tracks the long stretch between the killing and the opening of court proceedings years later, as the community keeps organizing, protesting, and insisting the case not be buried. The structure is part investigation and part courtroom process, but it's also a portrait of people forced to keep living on contested land while waiting for a system to acknowledge them at all. Martell has a gift for making place feel political. The landscape is beautiful, and it's also the thing everyone is fighting over. She pays attention to who gets believed, who gets dismissed, and how official language can sanitize violence. The film is angering in the right way because it does not let the story become abstract. It keeps returning to the human cost and to the simple question of whose ownership gets treated as real. Our last indie film in theaters this week is The Last One for the Road. Directed by Francesco Sosai. It follows two middle-aged friends, Carlo Bianchi and Doriano, who swear every drink is their last and then immediately order another. They're the type of guys who turn a simple outing into a rolling philosophy seminar. Half comedy, half confession. On one of their drifting days through the Italian countryside, they cross paths with Giulio, a shy architecture student who is clearly trying to move through life quietly. The two older men decide they are going to take him under their wing, whether he asks for it or not. Giulio resists at first, then gets pulled into their slow motion bender, riding along as they rant about life, globalization, money, and what happened to the places they grew up in. The film's pleasure is the triangle. The older guys are both ridiculous and weirdly insightful. Giulio is cautious, observant, and gradually loosened by the chaos. It becomes a road movie with the stakes of mood and identity, not crime or romance. So Psy gives it a meandering rhythm that still feels purposeful because each stop reveals a little more about what these people are running from. If you like character-driven European cinema that's funny, a little sad, and full of talk that actually sounds like talk, this will be your lane. So in theaters this week, that's Hook'em, Our Land, and The Last One for the Road. Our spotlight indie film on demand this week is Janet Planet. Directed by Annie Baker, it's set in rural western Massachusetts in the summer of 1991 and follows Lacey, an 11-year-old who is intensely attached to her mother, Janet. Lacey is bright, anxious, and always watching. Janet is magnetic and hard to pin down. Kind of parent who feels present and distant in the same hour. The film tracks their home life in quiet specific scenes, meals, long afternoons, small errands, and the way a summer can feel endless when you're a kid. A big part of the story is the parade of adults who drift into Janet's orbit, each bringing a different kind of energy into the house. Lacey reacts to all of them, sometimes with curiosity, sometimes with jealousy, sometimes with a kid's instinctive suspicion that she's being replaced. Julianne Nicholson plays Janet with a grounded warmth that never turns into a cartoon cool mom. You can feel the pull she has on people, and you can also feel how exhausting it is to be the person everyone leans on. Annie Baker's writing keeps things honest, doesn't force a dramatic lesson. It just shows how a child tries to understand adulthood by studying the adults closest to her. You can rent it on Apple TV or Amazon Video. Our indie film classic this week is Cave of Forgotten Dreams, celebrating its 15th anniversary. Directed by Werner Herzog, it's a 3D documentary made with rare access to the Chauvet Cave in southern France, a place closed to the public for preservation reasons. Inside are some of the oldest known human paintings, images of animals drawn tens of thousands of years ago, still visible as if the artists just stepped out for air. The film follows Herzog and a small crew as they move through narrow walkways and tight chambers under strict rules, limited time, limited gear, and no room for mistakes. What makes it gripping is not just the history, it's the feeling of proximity. You're watching people look at marks made by other people across an absurd stretch of time, and you can see the shock on their faces. Herzog mixes footage inside the cave with interviews from scientists and researchers who studied the art, the geology, and the conditions that preserved it. He also brings his own odd curiosity, which is exactly what you want here. This got a theatrical re-release last week, and it still plays like an event on a big screen because scale matters with images like these. But you can also watch it on Pluto TV. And that wraps it for May 1st, 2026 edition of Indie Film Weekly. If you want to help the show, keep it simple. Subscribe so you never miss an episode. Share it with one friend who actually goes to theaters. Rate it because that's the algorithm handshake. Then leave a quick review because that's how new listeners find us. Until next week, keep it restless, keep it wide eyed, and keep it indie.