Victorian Psycho Review: Maika Monroe Is Deliciously Unhinged

“I’m the sanest person I know.” That’s the first thing Winifred Notty tells us in Victorian Psycho, moments before arriving at a gothic manor to work as a governess. It’s also, obviously, a lie — and the fun of this film is watching exactly how far that lie is willing to go.

Based on Virginia Feito’s 2025 novel of the same name, Victorian Psycho is director Zachary Wigon’s follow-up to Sanctuary, and it swings hard for something rare: a gothic horror comedy that’s genuinely willing to get gross.

What’s It About

It’s 1858, and Winifred Notty (Maika Monroe) has just landed a job at the remote, isolated Ensor House. Her official duties involve teaching the household’s children table manners and family history. Her unofficial hobby is murder, and she’s remarkably good at hiding it — at least at first.

As Winifred settles into life at the estate, staff members start vanishing one by one, and the family she works for — cold Mrs. Pounds (Ruth Wilson) and her oblivious husband, Mr. Pounds (Jason Isaacs) — slowly starts to wonder whether their charming new governess might not be what she seems. Spoiler: she isn’t.

The Review

Maika Monroe is the whole show here, and she knows it. This is an actress who’s built a career out of playing women just slightly out of step with reality — Watcher, Longlegs, It Follows — and Winifred Notty might be her most committed performance yet. She plays the character’s madness with a chirpy, upbeat cheerfulness that makes every horrifying thing she does land even harder. Watching Winifred calmly narrate her own atrocities in voiceover, with the enthusiasm of someone describing a nice cup of tea, is where the film’s blackest comedy lives.

The film leans hard into period trappings — corsets, manners, rigid class lines between upstairs and downstairs — and then takes visible pleasure in shredding all of it. This is not a subtle movie. Bodies pile up. Blood sprays. At least one gruesome kill involves a wood chipper. If you came looking for a restrained, slow-burn gothic mystery, this isn’t that film, and it doesn’t pretend to be.

Thomasin McKenzie, as the household’s soft-spoken nurse Miss Lamb, gives the film its one genuinely sympathetic figure, and her strange, conspiratorial bond with Winifred early on is one of the film’s more interesting threads. Ruth Wilson and Jason Isaacs, playing the family Winifred is slowly picking apart, lean into the period-drama stiffness just enough to make their eventual comeuppance satisfying.

Style Over Substance?

Here’s where opinions split. Wigon shoots the film in a heightened, theatrical style — stagey blocking, pointed camera moves, a script that’s clearly more interested in tone than plausibility. For some viewers, that’s exactly the appeal: a movie fully committed to its own campy, blood-soaked reality. For others, that same heightened approach keeps the film at arm’s length, more interested in style than in building real tension.

Both readings are fair. This isn’t a film trying to scare you in a traditional sense. It’s trying to make you laugh and wince at the same time, and how well that lands will depend a lot on your tolerance for horror that’s playing things this broad.

Who This Is For

If you’re a fan of Maika Monroe, or you like your horror with a wicked sense of humor rather than pure dread, this is an easy recommendation. Fans of the source novel should also find plenty here to enjoy, since the film doesn’t soften any of the book’s nastier instincts.

Just know going in that this leans hard into gore and dark comedy over slow-building scares. If you’re after something quieter and more atmospheric, this probably isn’t your gothic horror movie.

The Verdict

Victorian Psycho is messy, gleefully violent, and anchored by a performance from Maika Monroe that’s worth the ticket price on its own. It won’t work for every horror fan, but for the right audience, it’s one of the more purely entertaining genre films of the year.

Rating: 4/5

Watch the Trailer

Quick Facts

• Title: Victorian Psycho
• Director: Zachary Wigon
• Writer: Virginia Feito (based on her novel)
• Genre: Horror, Dark Comedy
• Runtime: 90 minutes
• Rated: R (strong bloody violence, brief sexual material)
• Starring: Maika Monroe, Thomasin McKenzie, Ruth Wilson, Jason Isaacs
• Distributor: Bleecker Street
• World premiere: Cannes Film Festival 2026 (Un Certain Regard)
• US release: September 25, 2026 (limited theatrical)

Where to Watch

Victorian Psycho opens in select US theaters on September 25, 2026, via Bleecker Street.

Final Thoughts

Victorian Psycho isn’t trying to be tasteful, and that’s exactly the point. It’s a gleeful, blood-soaked showcase for Maika Monroe, wrapped in enough gothic atmosphere to keep it from feeling like a one-joke premise. If you like your horror with teeth and a wicked sense of humor, this one delivers.

Have you seen “Victorian Psycho”? Share your thoughts in the comments below.