The direction / editing / production design of this is off the charts amazing. I've seen a lot of people attempt what's done here, and apologies for all the buzz words but - a modern millennial social media horror story - and where all others have failed, this not only succeeds but impresses.
The idea and this kind of execution of a brightly lit bubbly beautiful horror in the style of a snapchap instaculture pop tale could have captured the zeitgeist in the manner of how the Excorist entralled the boomer generation that was given too heavy of a dose of religion growing up.
Unfortunately the screenplay is awful. The director should have taken a story credit and handed it over to an actual screenwriter who can actually write dialog, harness the themes that are here visually and put it into the actual body of the story, and done the character work needed so we'd be rooting for someone in all of this.
After this I would happily watch any Maggie Levin directs.... just so long as she brings in someone else to help write it. She is very clearly a great artist, writing just isn't her medium. Considering how skilled she is in everything else on display here that isn't a weakness, but failing to realize that is.
The idea and this kind of execution of a brightly lit bubbly beautiful horror in the style of a snapchap instaculture pop tale could have captured the zeitgeist in the manner of how the Excorist entralled the boomer generation that was given too heavy of a dose of religion growing up.
Unfortunately the screenplay is awful. The director should have taken a story credit and handed it over to an actual screenwriter who can actually write dialog, harness the themes that are here visually and put it into the actual body of the story, and done the character work needed so we'd be rooting for someone in all of this.
After this I would happily watch any Maggie Levin directs.... just so long as she brings in someone else to help write it. She is very clearly a great artist, writing just isn't her medium. Considering how skilled she is in everything else on display here that isn't a weakness, but failing to realize that is.