Just as Predator was once intended to be Commando 2, 10 Cloverfield Lane was once a spec screenplay (by John Campbell and Matt Stuecken) titled The Cellar in which a woman wakes up in a bomb shelter with a strange man who says he rescued her from an apocalyptic event.

The script, a one-room, micro-budget thriller, found its way to JJ Abrams's Bad Robot imprint where it was refashioned as a sequel – or more accurately parallel film – to the 2008 monster movie, Cloverfield.

Happily, 10 Cloverfield Lane proves a wildly effective white-knuckle affair, replete with twists, turns and terror, all jollied along by – hark, is that a Blaster Beam, we hear? – Bear McCreary's eerie, earworm score. Unhappily, the association with the Cloverfield franchise constitutes a significant spoiler.

With more than a tiny curtsey to Psycho, Michelle (Winstead) takes off her engagement ring and drives off into the night, only to be run off the road. She awakens in a concrete chamber, on a saline drip and chained to the wall. Her captor Howard talks of a catastrophic attack.

Emmet (The Newsroom's John Gallagher Jr), the only other survivor in the bunker, explains that Howard has a "black belt in conspiracy theories".

Is everyone Michelle knows dead? Is the air outside really toxic?

Or might whatever monsters lurk outside be preferable to present company?

The clue is in the title, folks, and yet, between Dan Trachtenberg’s clinical direction and Goodman’s menace – Howard often makes one pine for the Barton Fink’s comparatively cuddly Charlie Meadows – the viewer is never far away from the edge of their seat.

Small dramas – a brief (and cunning) flirtation between Michelle and Emmet at the dinner table, incorrect guesses in charades – explode into murderous rage and make for tremendous entertainment.