Rotten Tomatoes
Cancel Movies Tv shows FanStore News Showtimes

The Surrender

Play trailer 1:24 Poster for The Surrender Released May 23 1h 39m Horror Mystery & Thriller Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
85% Tomatometer 39 Reviews 49% Popcornmeter 50+ Ratings
A fraught mother-daughter relationship is put to a terrifying test when the family patriarch dies and the grieving mother hires a mysterious stranger to bring her husband back from the dead. As the bizarre and brutal resurrection spirals out of control, both women must confront their differences as they fight for their lives -- and for each other.
Watch on Fandango at Home Buy Now

Where to Watch

The Surrender

Critics Reviews

View More (39)
Claudia Puig FilmWeek (LAist) It's a very strong strong directorial debut... It's really fun to watch as an acting exercise, too. Jun 3, 2025 Full Review Simon Abrams RogerEbert.com “The Surrender” accomplishes a lot with a sketch-sized story and matching compositional agility and precision. It’s short (less than 90 minutes!) and sweet and the best kind of upsetting. Rated: 3/4 May 23, 2025 Full Review Alexandra Heller-Nicholas AWFJ.org The Surrender is a solid horror film, but where it truly excels is in its wholly singular, authentic and deeply empathetic portrait of palliative caregiving, which – as anyone who has ever done it knows – is a nightmare in and of itself May 18, 2025 Full Review John Daniel Tangalin The Cinema Spot The Surrender is focused on how carefulness and carelessness can go hand-in-hand. It’s one thing to attend to word of mouth, but it’s another thing not to take one’s beloved into consideration. Rated: 4/5 Jul 19, 2025 Full Review Cody Allen Geek Vibes Nation It’s not a film that seeks to startle, but to haunt—to leave you sitting with thoughts about your own family, your own memories, and the things we carry forward from those who raised us. Rated: 7.5 Jul 17, 2025 Full Review Julian Singleton Cinapse With its nuanced and deliberate approach to horror, The Surrender is quietly one of the standouts of SXSW 2025’s impressive Midnighter lineup. Jul 11, 2025 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View More (47)
Erman A. Y Colby played an excellent villain in Fear the Walking Dead. She is a great actress Rated 3 out of 5 stars 08/16/25 Full Review Alvaro Z https://alvarozinosamaro.substack.com/p/sometimes-dead-is-better Rated 4 out of 5 stars 08/09/25 Full Review Anthony M A tightly scripted little horror film with great performances from the two leads. The eternal mother and daughter dynamic is nicely done, and the horror element is the creepy icing on the cake. Rated 4 out of 5 stars 07/29/25 Full Review Claudio C The Surrender (2025) Atmospheric, Creepy, With a Disappointing Ending (11,853 – 25 Jul 2025 – by Claudio Carvalho) Megan (Colby Minifie) returns to the house of her estranged mother Barbara (Kate Burton) when she learns that her beloved father Robert (Vaughn Armstrong) has terminal cancer. Megan helps her mother to take care of Robert. When he dies, her mother becomes obsessed to revive him and brings a strange man (Neil Sandilands), indicated by a friend, to perform a ritual to bring Robert back. The skeptical Megan stays with her mother to not leave her alone with the man. Will the ritual work? “The Surrender” (2025) is an atmospheric and creepy horror movie with a disappointing ending. The storyline is very interesting, with an old woman obsessed to bring her husband back from the world of dead without thinking of the consequences. Her estranged daughter learns that she saw her father in a wrong way and did not know that her childhood had changed due to his control. But the conclusion with open end is awful, demanding the viewer to analyze possibilities of what might have happened to Megan without any clue; therefore, the work of Julia Max fails. My vote is five. Title (Brazil): Not Aplicable. My Blog: https://maniacosporfilme.wordpress.com/ Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 07/26/25 Full Review Gage H Grief is such a strong catalyst for a good horror movie. This movie explores who people become i the early stages of grief. How the most pragmatic person can be completely flipped on their head when they lose a loved one and how the decisions they make can effect loved ones. Ashley from the boys is underrated. Her acting in this movie is what draws you into the film. We need to see her in more movies this year! Rated 3 out of 5 stars 07/18/25 Full Review Ed O Cool premise, great suspense (up to a point) and supreme acting. Sadly the third act got swept away in a tiresome mudstream of random horror tropes and hamfisted clichés. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 06/28/25 Full Review Read all reviews
The Surrender

My Rating

Read More Read Less POST RATING WRITE A REVIEW EDIT REVIEW
Sinners 97% 96% Sinners Watchlist TRAILER for Sinners Bleeding 83% 93% Bleeding Watchlist Raging Grace 95% 60% Raging Grace Watchlist TRAILER for Raging Grace Speak No Evil 83% 83% Speak No Evil Watchlist TRAILER for Speak No Evil Nightsiren 100% 78% Nightsiren Watchlist Discover more movies and TV shows. View More

Movie Info

Synopsis A fraught mother-daughter relationship is put to a terrifying test when the family patriarch dies and the grieving mother hires a mysterious stranger to bring her husband back from the dead. As the bizarre and brutal resurrection spirals out of control, both women must confront their differences as they fight for their lives -- and for each other.
Director
Julia Max
Producer
Julia Max, Mia Chang, Lovell Holder, Ian McDonald, Robert J. Ulrich
Screenwriter
Julia Max
Distributor
Shudder
Genre
Horror, Mystery & Thriller, Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
May 23, 2025, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
May 23, 2025
Runtime
1h 39m
Most Popular at Home Now