Divided into three chapters, the first is standard slow-burn horror fare dressed in a stylish atmosphere, where bereaved little Gracie, who has become selectively mute, grows close to a creepy doll and begins to sense a presence in the forest outside her house. As Gracie grieves, her grandmother teachers her about her spiritual beliefs, stressing that it was a poor choice to have moved during the “month of hungry ghosts”. The second, falling back in time to 1885 where Benedict Wong and Jimmy O. Yang play two of the miners under attack, is a masterfully realised depiction of the massacre which, in its blunt, harrowing reenactment, serves as a direct interrogation of the radicalised, anti-immigrant violence in Trump’s America. When we return to the present for the third, we re-live the opening scenes through Emily’s (Tran) perspective as she tries to understand the mysterious force in the woods.

Despite its winding narrative, Rock Springs is held together by an atmospheric, poetic tone defined by a formal freedom that shifts between handheld and static shots, and wide frames and close ups. The moving camera and long takes in the massacre gives the scene a necessary urgency, and Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe’s score is effective throughout, finding thematic musical resonances between Emily’s cello and the sound of the Erhu, a traditional Chinese instrument.