For all the flashy premieres and celebrity appearances, film festivals are just as noteworthy for their hidden gems as they are their blockbuster debuts. At South by Southwest (SXSW), the annual festival that takes place in Austin, Texas, exciting new projects from all corners of the film industry will make their debuts or continue their festival runs.

Among the movies premiering are long-awaited sequels like Another Simple Favor and The Accountant 2, twisty new thrillers like Holland and Hallow Road, and genre fare like Drop and Death of a Unicorn.

While these movies have the power of studios like Amazon Prime and A24 behind them, some more under-the-radar films have only their premises to pique the audience’s interest. Fortunately, plenty of them sound worth checking out from their synopses alone. Below, we’ve highlighted four of the movies with the most intriguing premises that could end up being must-sees at SXSW.

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4

It Ends

It Ends follows a group of friends that find themselves quite literally on the highway to hell. When they take a wrong turn, they end up on an infinite road with “cosmic” horrors. Confined to their vehicle, it’s unclear if they’ll escape the “hellscape” they’ve found themselves stuck in.

Consider me sold. It Ends sounds both distressingly claustrophobic and disturbingly expansive, a specific kind of nightmare scenario that makes your skin crawl and your mind wander. Though it’s early, It Ends could prove to be an exciting new entry in the horror genre.

3

Redux Redux

Kevin and Matthew McManus are two of the people behind one of the funniest Netflix series of all time, American Vandal. This time, though, they’re getting a bit more existential and, from the sound of it, a lot more violent.

Redux Redux follows a mother named Irene Kelly, who, after the murder of her daughter, travels through parallel universes to get revenge upon her daughter’s murderer over and over again. When she becomes addicted to this act, her grasp on her own humanity begins to weaken.

The multiverse concept has been done to death over the last half decade, culminating in a Best Picture win for Everything Everywhere All at Once. This time, though, the concept sounds like it’s being used for something much more visceral and emotional and if the McManuses pull this off, it could provide a fresh spin on the multiversal genre.

2

Good Boy

I love a good pet movie. I also love a good horror movie. Good Boy, directed by Ben Leonberg, looks to be combining both. The premise is quite simple – a dog named Indy is the only one who can see the ghostly forces haunting the family home he and his owner, Todd, have recently moved into.

When those supernatural forces start to threaten Todd, Indy is forced into action and may be the only one who can save him. Good Boy promises a lot of danger for its furry protagonist, which makes its stakes all the higher.

No one likes to see an adorable dog in danger, but getting to see him be the hero amidst what sounds like a chilling haunted house story feels like an exciting new take on the subgenre.

1

Odyssey

The plot synopsis for Odyssey makes it sound like a Safdie brothers nightmare in line with Good Time or Uncut Gems. It follows a London estate agent named Natasha Lynn who gets wrapped up in a kidnapping plot that leads her on a violent, drug-fueled journey.

Of course, underneath her hard exterior, she is already falling apart, so the mounting pressure of the kidnapping plot is sure to lead to her mental unraveling. As someone who loves anxiety-laced thrillers, this sounds like the perfect film to add to this growing subgenre.