Talk To Me

2023 Directed by Danny Philippou, Michael Philippou

Horror Marathon 2024 Day 5 Film 12

This starts with a particularly sheer moment of violence- a man is being pulled away from a party and during the scuffle he stabs his brother and kills himself. Later, we find that a new social media trend has teens having their eyes blacked out and being possessed by spirits. It's seance as party game- as the main character Mia tries to find a new sense of family with her friends after her mother committed suicide.

The friends sit with a disembodied hand, holding it and asking the spirits to be invited into them. As a possession film it stands out- with the creepy party game becoming this cool trip to go on... gasping and stuttering for breath and 90s seconds later they're released. The pacing comes quickly, as they inevitably fuck it all up- not knowing what entities they're really inviting in for the viral/ chain letter/meme of it all.

Most of the power of the film relies on Sophie Wilde's performance of Mia- selling this disjointed and over the top frantic language that could be seen as pretty corny with other possession type films. Some of the film's violence does feel a bit cheezy though, with some feeling like right out of an Evil Dead comedic bloodletting. The film doesn't lose its effectiveness to scare, even if the ending that is a bit obvious.