Nerdly » HorRHIFFic 2025: ‘All This Time’ Review

28th Feb2025

HorRHIFFic 2025: ‘All This Time’ Review

by Phil Wheat

Stars: Emily Rose Holt, Daniel De Bourg, Emma Pallant, Darcey Brown, Dean Michael Gregory, Michaela Short, Luke Lindemann, Lyndsey Craine | Written and Directed by Rob Worsey

Taking a night out from motherhood, Grace (Emily Rose Holt) attends a lavish party at a nearby mansion. However the next morning she finds herself trapped inside the house in an endless time loop. To have any hope of escaping the mansion and returning to her normal life and young child, Grace must unlock the secrets of the house, the enigmatic owner Elias (Daniel De Bourg), and the previous night’s party.

Right from the off, All This Time nails the gothic atmosphere, leaning into the tropes of gothic horror, with an eerie atmosphere and a mise-en-scene that brilliantly reflects the dark nature of the story, the mansion and the characters within. So much so that the mansion itself, with its dark wooden wooden and intricately carved architecture becomes something of a character in itself.

Jordan Lee who previously worked with writer/director Rob Worsey on his 2022 film Among the Living, delivers some truly superb cinematography, making the most of the landscapes (including some stunning shots of the forest surrounding the mansion) and the grand manor house in which the film takes place, which really adds to the gothic nature of the film. As does the music from Teo Beaume – that resonates most powerfully during an early montage sequence in which Grace discovers she’s trapped in the mansion, her many attempts at escape are thwarted by the rough iron gates in the grounds; and then later on in the film as Grace plans her last, final, push to free herself of the situation she’s in.

Speaking of gates, I couldn’t help but think of the 1981 Linda Blair-starring horror Hell Night when I first saw Grace’s attempt to circumvent them and make her escape, in fact All This Time could be seen as a companion piece, or possibly inspired by, that film – with both our heroines trapped against their will in a mansion that is as creepy as its residents. Although Worsey forgoes the stalk-and-slash aspect of that 1981 film and instead focuses on building mystery and suspense.

There comes a point where Grace seemingly manages to escape the mansion, thanks to the assistance of the family’s housekeeper (Emma Pallant) and the mysterious young girl (Darcey Brown) who keeps popping up in both the house and its gardens, however things don’t get any clearer after that as Grace soon finds more strange folk in the woods and, this being a time loop, she soon finds herself back inside the mansion, plotting her escape again.

This loop goes on and on, with Grace seemingly getting that little bit further into the woods, finding out snippets of new information, meeting new people outside the mansion (some of whom look and act as trapped as she does), before eventually, in a classic case of horror movie cliche, discovering who, or what, Elias is, and the real danger she truly is in.

Well, I say realising what dangers Grace is in but… unfortunately, Worsey’s film suffers from what a lot of mysteries do – giving us more and more information without any seemingly logical answers. Or any answers at all for that matter, instead piling on the mystery, introducing us to more odd characters that act stranger than the next and hoping that the gothic atmosphere and the overall eeriness of proceedings will carry the film. It does for a while but come halfway, when Grace has escaped one too many times, you start to wonder if even the filmmakers know what’s going on.

Eventually, things build to a crescendo between Grace and Elias as she confronts him in hopes of ending the madness and ending Elias. And finally, finally, Worsey gives us the big reveal: what’s happening to Grace, what happened at the party, and why Elias is keeping her trapped in the mansion. And that’s when the truly wonderful nature of All This Time comes to the fore and the film’s true story is revealed and, honestly, it’s remarkable. Explaining EVERYTHING. All the mystery, all the odd behaviour, and even the “time loop” and it turns out… well, you know that phrase “I know nothing and everything I do know is wrong”? That couldn’t be more apt for All This Time!