For awhile Alexandre Aja was the Next Big Thing as far as horror directors go.

In 2003 his High Tension (know as Haute Tension in the original French and Switchblade Romance in the U.K.) was described as “Disturbing, demented, gory and one of the best horror films I’ve seen in awhile,” by Felix Vasquez, Jr of Cinema Crazed (yeah, I’ve never heard of him either).

Not all critics viewed it quite so favorably, but that’s on par for horror movies.

His follow up to High Tension, 2006’s remake of Wes Craven’s The Hills Have Eyes was remarkable, as was Maniac in 2012.

The problem was, despite being an undeniably talented director he doesn’t always make the wisest choices as far as projects as Piranha 3D (2010), Horns (2013), and The 9th Life of Louis Drax (2016) illustrate.

Well, Aja is back in 2019 with Crawl, a movie about a few individuals in a Florida town that have to deal with a hurricane and alligators.

And…it looks pretty good. Is it a return to form for Alexandre Aja?

Who knows but unlike his most recent efforts I’m actually curious to find out.