I watched Shelby Oaks as part of Beyond Fest at American Cinematheque. You can check out the full schedule here.

Shelby Oaks is a wild movie through and through. It’s definitely creepy and the story behind how the movie was made isn’t creepy, but still just as improbable. It comes from YouTube Movie Critic Chris Stuckmann, and is a passion project of his. It was supposed to be an independent movie that he was going to release on the platform, and then NEON stepped in and bought the film, allowing it a massive theatrical release. The movie begins like it’s going to be a true crime documentary, and then Stuckmann breaks whatever unwritten rules of cinema exist, and it transitions on a dime from that into a story of a sister trying to find her lost sibling.

It stars Camille Sullivan as Mia, who is trying to find her sister Riley (played by Sarah Durn). Riley and her friends are YouTubers who run a channel all about the paranormal and they end up disappearing without a trace during a shoot in the ghost town of Shelby Oaks. From there, the film follows Mia’s journey through the horror and terror of the town and its surrounding story to get to Riley. The sequence right at the beginning of the film that changes the perspective from true crime doc to story-based narrative is masterfully done by Stuckmann. He’s got experience in it from his YouTube channel, but make no mistake, Shelby Oaks doesn’t feel like it belongs on YouTube.

The film is terrifying, but is it good, is it bad, or is it ugly? Let’s dive in.

The Bad And Ugly Of Shelby Oaks

There’s a lot to like about Shelby Oaks, so I’ll start off with the small amount that I didn’t like about the film. The only real complaint I can say about the film is the way that it builds and releases tension. Like any good horror movie, it builds and ratchets up the tension on the audience until it gets to the point where they can’t take anymore and then hits you with a scare or a diversion. However, Shelby Oaks, and it could be that this is intentional, it doesn’t always provide that release, instead having the audience sit with a whole load of tension for the next couple of scenes. That release, whether it’s a cat coming out of a cabinet in Alien or a joke in another movie, is just as important as the scares because it allows for the audience to breath a bit.

The film doesn’t do this for every scare and some of them are paid off incredibly well, but for some of them, it does make the experience a bit lesser.

But other than that, there’s so much to enjoy about Shelby Oaks.

The Good Of Shelby Oaks

Shelby Oaks shows off a tremendous ability to unnerve audiences. Whether it’s some of the scares being in the background at first and moving around, or just the subject matter of demons, the occult, and more, it is just plain scary. The most tense scenes in the film feel like they linger but end up leaving just in time. Everything feels intentional in a good way. Camille Sullivan drives the entire thing with her performance, providing strength, weakness, and someone for the audience to root for.

The way the film mashes up the normal storytelling, the “YouTube” style found footage videos, and even the true crime documentary footage is masterful from Stuckmann and Co.. There’s an intense atmosphere of dread throughout that pervades. I tend to judge how scary a movie is by how it influences my behavior after watching it, and I wanted to sleep with the TV on and a nightlight after seeing this movie.

Once you get to the third act, the tension is through the roof and the entire sort of ordeal that Riley goes through is explained. The ending of the film is just as shocking and tense as the rest of it, and leaves plenty of questions for audiences to think about as the credits roll.

Shelby Oaks is a fantastic debut for director Chris Stuckmann with plenty of dread and terror for horror fans to chew on. The ways he blends YouTube style filmmaking with found footage and breaks the rules shows a filmmaker with talent beyond just his debut movie.

Shelby Oaks releases in theaters on October 24th, 2025.

For more on Horror, make sure to check out Fright-A-Thon.

Keep Reading:

The 2025 Halloween Movie Marathon Schedule [Fright-A-Thon]