Black Cab (2024) – A Frosty reception from a black-hearted cabbie in bleak horror fare

There’s a strange, subtle tension in the experience of calling a cab. Uber gives us a genial thumbnail of our driver and their ratings, some semblance of a comfort blanket of who is going to be taking us from point A to B. But in the traditional lucky dip of taxis at a stand, there’s always the gnawing thought that the person you’re trusting with your personal space and your life could be the exact opposite. Bruce Goodison’s dark thriller, Black Cab, takes that intrusive thought and throws in a beastly, mercurial Nick Frost as its untrustworthy cabbie for good measure, a clever move for a small film with its sights set on discomfort and intensity. But is the overall ride a smooth and speedy journey?

The opening suggests it won’t be. Ahead of a begrudging engagement dinner with her friends and egotistical fiancee Patrick (Luke Norris), put-upon young woman Anne (Synnøve Karlsen) is plagued with nightmares of a spectral figure (Tilly Woodward) haunting her cab ride down a red-hued road at night. Her waking life isn’t much better; she has to deal with the horror of an impending unhappy marriage while her best friend Jessica (Tessa Parr) tries to persuade her otherwise… to no avail. As the night ends with a sour note, the discontented couple hop in a cab with tinted windows, full to the brim with overfamiliarity from its driver Ian (Nick Frost), a family man with a huge concern for kids, both his own and others. It’s not long before the doors are locked and the taser comes out, and Anne and Patrick find themselves victim to a nefarious plot that Anne’s troubled dreams may have given her a sneak preview of. Whether her foresight is a gift or a curse depends on her ability to outwit her would-be ride home, and the lines between life and death are blurred as a black bargain is struck with otherworldly forces…

One can’t begrudge Frost for taking a risk like this. An actor who has always trodden the line between comedy and horror, his collaborations under Edgar Wright set him up as one half of British cinema’s best nerd comedians. Yet while Simon Pegg has joined the main crew of the IMF and Starfleet respectively, Frost has created a riskier, far more modest and fringe career, picking up supporting comic relief roles here and there and also leading a smaller British comedy or two. 2024 has seen him branch out and come back in interesting ways, first of all with sit-com splatterfest Krazy House, cosmic black comedy romance Timestalker and now with Black Cab, which affords him the opportunity to flex a muscle few knew he had. He’s genuinely menacing in places here, spitting out vicious threats and glowering in the rearview mirror at his prey during the most overtly intimidating scenes, all of which are made more effective by his natural geniality as a comedy actor. How much pathos nasty Ian earns by the film’s heavy-laden ending is up for debate, but Frost’s surprisingly effective turn as a grounded horror villain works brilliantly and gives the film a disturbed heart it may not otherwise have grown.

Synnøve Karlsen’s Anne is a good foil against Frost’s brute, and shoulders a role that exists mostly in abstraction and backstory very well. Her dour mood is palpable from minute one, and she realistically portrays a terrible night getting a whole lot worse with a three-dimensionality many others may have neglected to build. And in a less well-rounded role, Luke Norris balances some obnoxious charisma and noxious toxicity very nicely too, taking a bad boyfriend character and smartly never quite pulling him away from his inherent dislikeability; some people just aren’t meant to be fully redeemed. The central trio form a solid small cast that keep the wheels spinning through this tightly-wound situation, even if their destination lies after a long and windy road.

Its eventual bridging of two distinctive horror ideas deflates the action instead of deepening it. Ian’s true motivations and Anne’s significance to his plan require a lot of expository monologuing from Frost and some speculative horror movie rules that take a fair amount of suspension of disbelief to make sense even to the characters, never mind the audience. The end result is a muddled third act that deals with loss, unspeakable deals and cyclical irony, delivering chills in moments but feeling distinctly overreaching beyond the taut bad cabbie thriller that preceded it. However, Goodison can carve out a good scare from stock imagery, and Virginia Gilbert’s script cleverly ends on the most downbeat note possible, so there’s still plenty to get the pulse raising even as the drama switches down to second gear when it should be going full throttle. 

Shudder has done well to pick up this little brutaliser and showcase Frost’s talents away from his home turf, with his status as horror stalwart making total sense in a brand new context. While it might not linger long beyond its sudden, subversive final moments, Black Cab proves to be a good time on a Friday night: dark, diverting and diabolical. Drop it a tip and a good rating while you’re at it!

Simon’s Archive – Black Cab