By Scarlett Tarango
The new horror movie Obsession has made over $80 million in the box office so far on a $750,000 budget, making it one of the few movies ever to make back its budget 100 times over. There are a lot of things that made this movie stand out next to the other recent horror movies in theaters lately, so what made Obsession work so well?
The film was written and directed by Curry Barker an American filmmaker, starring Inde Navarrette and Michael Johnson. Many have expressed relief that the movie includes fresh faces instead of the same actors we’ve become used to always seeing in movies.
For a little background, the movie follows Bear, a guy trying to ask out his friend, Nikki. He ends up using a wishing toy to wish that Nikki loved him more than anyone else in the world, which as expected, backfires completely. Nikki loses complete control of her autonomy and starts acting odd and completely obsessed with Bear against her will.
One of the things that makes this movie so scary is its complete blend of all kinds of horror elements. Some movies can tend to feel cheesy when there’s too much of one thing for example, too many jumpscares and not enough story. The mix of it all is something this film does really well.
The movie uses elements of suspense, jumpscares, psychological horror, and overall unsettlement. One of the most unsettling parts about the movie is its use of uncanny valley. Uncanny valley is the disturbance people experience when facing things that imitate human features but aren’t quite human.
Once under the spell, Nikki begins acting in ways that aren’t quite human, like acting really strange and nonsensical in conversations, committing disturbing acts like duck taping doors and watching Bear sleep, having unstable emotions, and as the movie progresses even physically moving in extremely unnatural ways.
One of the scenes that have many talking about it from the movie is Nikki literally walking in reverse when that shouldn’t be possible. In the moment of the scene it’s really unsettling to watch. In another scene, Nikki stands in a dark corner, moving around in ways that don’t seem right. She was even given uncanny valley makeup to distort her facial features in this shot to make the whole thing even more unhuman.
Something that a lot of horror movies lately lack is something to say. Obsession’s message truly adds to the psychological horror of it all. Before watching the movie you might believe that Bear was the victim of the situation, but tragically it was Nikki herself who was.
Nikki completely lost control of her mind and body, forced to love only Bear and to have her entire well being rely on being around him. It’s not flat out said whether Nikki ever saw Bear in a romantic way or not from the start. Either way, the idea of her losing her ability to make her own decision is what makes the movie so disturbing. Bear selfishly forced her into the relationship, completely ignoring her all odd behavior to fulfill his own selfish desires. The movie highlights Bear’s flaws and how he was truly at fault.
Obsession is truly a gem that you don’t really get to see that often in the horror genre. It has a compelling tragic story while simultaneously remaining an amazing anxiety inducing horror film. If you haven’t seen it yet, I recommend you catch it while it’s still in theaters, but maybe bring some friends and a blanket to hide under.
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