A Modern Threat, Told in a Familiar Way

Read Time:5 Minute, 18 Second

MOVIE REVIEW
DRAGN
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Genre: Sci-Fi, Thriller, Horror
Year Released: 2025, 2026 VOD
Runtime: 1h 31m
Director(s): Peter Webber
Writer(s): Barry Hutchison, Alexander Gordon Smith, Alex Lane
Cast: James Paxton, Lilly Krug, Carlos Bardem, Alice Pagani, Franz Drameh
Where to Watch: available now, watch here: www.cineverse.com or www.amazon.com

RAVING REVIEW: DRAGN is a stripped-down survival thriller built around a concept that tells you what it is, then spends the rest of its runtime examining and exploring that idea further than it naturally wants to go. A group of coworkers, a remote forest, a rogue AI drone hunting them one by one. It’s direct and, honestly, pretty effective for about the first half, when the film leans into the tension rather than trying to be something bigger. An interesting experience that leaves you with a lot to think about.

The structure works because it’s familiar in the right way. You can feel the DNA of older genre films baked into it, especially that “group dropped into a kill zone” structure where personalities start clashing before the threat even reveals itself. There’s a brief stretch where the film figures things out, unease builds, small details start to feel off, and when things finally turn, it has just enough momentum to pull you in. The drone itself is a solid idea for a modern antagonist, not just for what it does, but for what it represents. It’s not emotional, not unpredictable in a human way, just cold and adaptive, which gives the story a different kind of threat than a typical slasher or creature feature. But that early momentum doesn’t last.

Once the film commits to its premise, it becomes repetitive in a way hard to ignore. The structure becomes predictable with separation, chase, attack, then wash and repeat. The tension created begins to ease. The film wants you to care about who survives, but it doesn’t spend enough time making those people feel like something beyond a surface-level connection. You get just enough characterization to understand their roles, but not enough to know who they really are, or make them stick with you in that way.

James Paxton does what he can as the center, giving the film a grounded perspective, especially as things escalate. There’s an attempt to tie his character to something personal, to give the chaos a sense of purpose beyond survival, and those moments help to build the larger world around the chaos, but they’re not enough to carry the entire second half. The rest of the cast falls into more familiar territory, where performances are functional but not particularly memorable, a trend that becomes more noticeable as the film leans harder on its ensemble dynamic.

What DRAGN does have going for it is a clear thematic undercurrent, even if it’s not always handled subtly. The idea that the drone isn’t just malfunctioning but evolving based on what it’s been exposed to adds something genuinely compelling. The film touches on that idea, technology reflecting human behavior, systems are shown being built without accountability, but it never explores it in a way that feels as important to the story as I wanted. It’s there, you can see it, but it mostly stays at the surface level instead of shaping things in a meaningful way.

Visually and tonally, the film leans into a more stripped, almost throwback style. It feels intentionally lean, built around movement and immediacy rather than scale, which works in its favor. There’s a roughness to it that fits the premise, especially in the way the action is staged and how the environment is used. Interestingly, that same simplicity also exposes its limitations. When the pacing dips, there isn’t much else there to hold onto.

By the time we’re fully entrenched in the world, the film starts to feel like it’s running out of ideas rather than building toward a conclusion. It introduces just enough escalation to suggest something bigger is coming, but never quite delivers on what that is, maybe trying to set up a sequel? The ending leans into the concept rather than the characters, which fits the film’s overall approach but doesn’t leave much lasting impact.

There’s a version of DRAGN that could have worked better by either leaning 100% into that ground-level realism, embracing its simplicity and keeping the tension going full force the entire time, or expanding its ideas into a deeper psychological thriller. Instead, it sits somewhere in the middle, where the concept is strong enough to carry parts of the film, but not enough to sustain it all the way through.

DRAGN is engaging and captivating, with many interesting ideas, but it never scales to the level a film like this could. It’s not bad and is definitely worth watching for a near-future thriller. There’s enough here to hold your attention, just not enough to make it stick.

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