Where to stream M. Night Shyamalan’s divisive cursed-vacation thriller next
Talk about a left-field move: a major DCU star’s first film role is in a disturbing thriller.
If you like your movies full of existential dread and weird, high-stakes mysteries, M. Night Shyamalan usually has you covered. Love him or loathe him – and let's be honest, plenty do both, sometimes in the same film – the bloke doesn't half know how to come up with a premise that gets you talking. Back in 2021, his film Old slid into cinemas with all the trimmings of a classic Shyamalan mindbender, though as is now tradition, plenty of people left the cinema either confused, impressed, or both.
Old first hit cinemas in July 2021 and now lands on Peacock from 1 August 2026.
That Shyamalan Twist, Again
So here’s the setup: a bunch of strangers are on holiday (as you do), get whisked off to a private beach that screams Instagram paradise, and – because this is Shyamalan – it all goes spectacularly sideways. The kids suddenly age by years in a matter of minutes, the adults start sprouting grey hairs and crows’ feet at unnatural speed, and bodies start acting in ways even your GP couldn't explain. Turns out, they're trapped by some mad geological anomaly that fast-forwards your life by decades, whether you fancy it or not.
All very on-brand for M. Night, who built his rep on films like The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable — giant ideas, big emotional swings, and usually Something Not Quite Normal lurking under the surface. Old takes its story from Sandcastle, a graphic novel by Pierre Oscar Lévy and Frederik Peeters. Oddly enough, no one had tried adapting that particular nightmare to the big screen before.
The Cast and the Quibbles
If nothing else, Old gives good line-up: there’s Gael García Bernal, Vicky Krieps, Rufus Sewell, Alex Wolff, Thomasin McKenzie, and a pre-DC-buzz Aaron Pierre making his feature debut. The script, typically for Shyamalan, is all his own work.
Now, the hype machine was working overtime for this one: Super Bowl teasers, Snapchat gimmicks, the whole nine yards. Coming out of that post-pandemic slump, it managed to turn an $18 million budget into over $90 million worldwide, which is nothing to sniff at. But did critics warm to it? Not exactly. It’s got a dead-average 50% on Rotten Tomatoes with audiences just as split at 53%. Fans couldn’t agree on whether the film’s bonkers plot was clever or just full of holes; the writing, some said, was thin, and the final twist — which adds a whole extra chunk onto the source novel — left many thinking it was all a little much. Shyamalan does love a last-minute curveball, but here it didn’t win everyone over. Still, for all its messiness, you can’t fault the man for originality.
- Gael García Bernal as Guy
- Vicky Krieps as Prisca
- Rufus Sewell as Charles
- Alex Wolff as Trent (aged up)
- Thomasin McKenzie as Maddox (aged up)
- Aaron Pierre as Mid-Sized Sedan
- Assorted cast in ‘older’ and ‘younger’ variations due to the time-warping shenanigans
If you fancy giving Old another go or missed it the first time, it’s now landed on Peacock alongside a stack of other titles — One Hour Photo, Escape Room, Almost Famous, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and a bunch more. Maybe the beach will hit differently on a rewatch, or maybe you’ll end up shouting at the telly all over again. Up to you.