Death of a Unicorn

The sound of a mythical creature being pulverized by the grille of a luxury SUV is not quite what I expected. It’s less of a celestial chime and more of a sickening, wet thud followed by the sound of expensive German engineering grinding to a halt. This is how Alex Scharfman chooses to introduce us to the absurdity of Death of a Unicorn, a film that feels like it was grown in a petri dish using DNA from Succession, The Cabin in the Woods, and a very dark fever dream about a Lisa Frank sticker book.

I watched this while my neighbor was power-washing his driveway at 9 PM on a Tuesday, and honestly, the aggressive, industrial hum from outside my window provided a strangely fitting rhythmic accompaniment to the corporate sterility on screen.

Roadkill in the Garden of Eden

At its heart, the movie is a twisted father-daughter road trip. Paul Rudd plays Elliot, a man who radiates the kind of frantic, mid-tier management anxiety that I find deeply relatable whenever I have more than four unread emails. He’s driving his daughter Ridley (Jenna Ortega) to a weekend retreat hosted by his billionaire boss, Odell, played with a delightful, reptilian charm by Richard E. Grant.

When they hit the titular beast, the film pivots from a tense indie drama into something far more grotesque. The unicorn isn't just a dead animal; it’s a biological goldmine. Jenna Ortega, who has essentially become the patron saint of modern cinematic macabre after Wednesday and Ti West's X, handles the transition with her signature deadpan grit. While Elliot is busy hyperventilating about his career, Ridley is the one staring at the glowing, glittery viscera on the pavement, realizing that the world just broke.

A Masterclass in Deadpan Dread

The second act shifts to the retreat, and this is where Alex Scharfman (who also wrote the screenplay) really leans into the "A24-ness" of it all. This isn't a film interested in the wonder of magic; it's interested in the commodification of it. Once the body is brought to the compound, the horror isn't about ghosts or monsters—it’s about a boardroom of executives trying to figure out how to patent immortality.

Richard E. Grant is a standout here, treating the discovery of a mythical creature with the same cold, analytical hunger a vulture might show a dying calf. Alongside him is Will Poulter as Shepard, a character who manages to be both physically imposing and deeply unsettling in that way Poulter perfected in Midsommar. The unicorn’s blood looks suspiciously like a melted Blue Raspberry ICEE, but the way the cast reacts to it makes it feel like the most dangerous substance on Earth.

The tension doesn't come from jump scares. Instead, it’s built through the score by Dan Romer (Luca, Beasts of the Southern Wild), which oscillates between whimsical fairytale melodies and dissonant, buzzing dread. It’s the sound of a childhood story being stripped for parts.

The High Cost of Immortality

What makes Death of a Unicorn stick in my craw—in a good way—is how it handles the "Contemporary Cinema" tropes of billionaire-bashing. We’ve seen a lot of "Eat the Rich" cinema lately (The Menu, Glass Onion), but Scharfman avoids the easy punchlines. Instead, he focuses on the tragedy of the enablers. Paul Rudd’s Elliot isn't a villain; he’s just a guy who wants to keep his health insurance, which makes his complicity in the literal butchering of magic feel all the more nauseating.

Sunita Mani as Dr. Bhatia provides a necessary grounded perspective, though her character often feels like she’s there to explain the "science" of the miracle before the film remembers it’s supposed to be a horror-comedy. If there’s a flaw, it’s that the movie occasionally trips over its own tonal ambitions. Is it a satire? A creature feature? A family drama? It tries to be all three, and while it usually succeeds, the pacing in the middle act drags like a unicorn carcass tied to a bumper.

The practical effects, however, are a triumph. In an era where Marvel-grade CGI often feels like unflavored gelatin, the physical presence of the unicorn—designed with a mix of beauty and "uncanny valley" wrongness—is startling. It has a weight to it. When they start poking and prodding it, you feel the violation.

Ultimately, Death of a Unicorn is a sharp, sparkly needle of a movie that pokes fun at our obsession with "wellness" and corporate salvation. It’s a film that knows exactly how much we’re willing to sacrifice for a chance at never dying, and it isn't afraid to get some glittery blood on its hands to prove the point. It might have slipped through the cracks during its initial release because it’s a bit too weird for the mainstream and a bit too cynical for the fantasy crowd, but it’s exactly the kind of "oddity" we’ll be talking about in five years. Paul Rudd has never been more stressed, and honestly, I’ve never liked him more.