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TALK TO ME MOVIE REVIEW
The A24 production logo on this new horror movie should give you a sense of the quality and craft you can expect. And coming from the YouTube twins Danny and Michael Philippou, you can also expect a certain level of twisted quality. This is the duo who went viral with shorts like Ronald McDonald embarking on a relentless rampage in a chicken joint, Harry Potter and Luke Skywalker engaged in an epic showdown using wands and lightsabers, and Cookie Monster decimating the Power Rangers in a gory spectacle. These two are perfect choices to tell a story about an online trend that goes too far. The premise centers on a social media-driven frenzy of spiritual possession, triggered by grasping a ceramic-encased severed hand adorned with names and enigmatic symbols representing its previous owners. Aussie teens Mia, Jade, and Jade’s younger brother Riley find themselves drawn into this deadly game, granting them 90 seconds of interaction with the spirits of the deceased. However, when the spirits are unleashed, the teens undergo a haunting transformation, with their pupils turning deep black, and their bodies wracked by shivers and asphyxiation, as if teetering on the edge of death. Amidst the macabre spectacle, their giddy friends eagerly document these chilling encounters. Ya know, like Tide Pods, but with demons, or the Kiki Challenge, but with less Drake. Mike, Frank, and T.C. discuss the visceral experience they had watching this movie and dissect the surprisingly nuanced take on grief and the devastating consequences that are inflicted upon those willing to risk literal possession just to speak to the other side.
DIRECTED BY: Danny and Michael Philippou
STARRING: Sophie Wilde, Alexandra Jensen, Joe Bird, Miranda Otto, Otis Dhanji, Zoe Terakes, Chris Alosio, Alexandria Steffensen, Marcus Johnson, Sunny Johnson, Ari McCarthy
YOUR REVIEWERS
T.C. De Witt (Screener Squad)
T.C. De Witt is a multi-awarded writer/director originally from Wisconsin and now based in Los Angeles. His life has been devoted to the arts since he was a child. He’s been a stage performer, playwright, stand-up comic, film and television actor, radio DJ, podcaster published author, recorded musician, and comic writer/illustrator. He is now a professional screenwriter and has been thriving for the past decade, regularly offering his talents to production studios in LA, Chicago, Milwaukee, and internationally in Sydney and Poland. He’s provided content for Amazon Prime, Netflix, and several YouTube partners. His films have screened internationally, and his stageplays have been performed across the country. In the last ten years, he has directed 57 films, 23 episodes of his series The One Minute Rewatch, 300+ episodes of podcasts, and his multi-award-winning short film Screen: Righter screened at the Festival de Cannes in 2016. He has released two feature films, The Princess Knight and A Christmas Sunset. He thrives on collaboration and the thrill of sharing stories in all forms.
Frank Calvillo (Highly Suspect Reviews, Screener Squad)
Born and raised in South Texas, Frank currently lives in Austin and has been in love with movies ever since his father showed him some Three Stooges shorts when he was five years old. Today he loves all kinds of film, regardless of era, country, budget or genre. He believes every film has an audience and is at least one person’s favorite movie. After writing for Sight & Sound and Slackerwood, he now writes for Cinapse where his increasingly random taste in all flavors of cinema (from Rashomon to Mars Attacks!) continues to thrive. His ultimate goal is to write a script for his boyhood crush, Michelle Pfeiffer.
Mike J. McAllister (Screener Squad, Staff Writer, Head Video Editor)
Mike J. McAllister is a filmmaker, editor, writer and animator. He is also a film junkie, dog lover and Surge-aholic (Hi, Mike). He grew up in a small town in Western Pennsylvania, where he earned the reputation as the “human IMDb” and was on a first-name basis with every video store clerk in town. He later studied film in Pittsburgh. He has since written several unproduced screenplays and TV pilots. He has also produced a number of short films, some of which have appeared in festivals across the country. He is a ninja with Final Cut Pro and is armed with a mind full of mostly useless pop-culture trivia. He also enjoys animation, MST3K, classic video games and being the “music geek” among his friends (which really just means he buys vinyl and listens to music that doesn’t come from an anime soundtrack). He resides in Austin, Texas, and can be followed on the Instamagrams at @ohheyitsmikejm.
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