Director: Calvin Morie McCarthy
Year: 2022
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural
Plot:
After struggling with her divorce, a woman caught in the grip of a series of debilitating anxiety attacks agrees to join a sleep-disorder study to find out more about her condition, but when they start disappearing realizes that a demon has been let loose on them and must find a way to stop it.
Review:
This was a pretty decent if somewhat flawed genre effort. Among the better features here is the fine work this does in generating the necessary groundwork to deliver a believable setup for the demon to appear and torment everyone. With enough given about her nightmarish life in the form of the divorce and starting over on top of the need to get over the debilitating physical conditions she’s suffering from, the need to visit the facility and partake in the study is handled quite well. That leads to the rather fun time spent here building up the need for his personal interest in the study which comes in the form of a series of several rather fun psychological and sociological-fueled debates about the purpose of messing with the human mind through hypnosis. Seeing how they all react to the material and manage to undergo the study together serves this one quite nicely and gives this a great starting point to work with.
This lets the film have a lot of fun with the actual scenes of the demon coming out of the darkness to attack and torment them. Featuring the setup of the encounters taking place in their dreams with the characters in bed when the figure emerges out of the darkness either through the hallway door or the closet nearby while appearing in eerie bright light and letting the disturbing appearance wor wonders, the whole setup comes off genuinely terrifying at points. Knowing that the experiences are based on actual nightmarish concepts involving the inability to move or escape once you become aware of someone or something demonic in the room with you whispering if your ear or hovering over you screaming maniacally adds much to these scenes and carries a great atmospheric touch to them. Once the group realizes that they have to battle the creature head-on together, this one comes off with a solid sense of action at the end which gives this a lot to like overall.
There are some minor issues to be had with this one. One of the biggest drawbacks to be had here is the highly underwhelming and lethargic pace that plays out as this one takes quite a while to get going. Despite all the stellar work that goes into making the setup have a sound psychological groundwork, the fact that so much of it goes through endless rounds of skeptical counterarguing about the effectiveness of the treatments and their sociological bearing on different generations causes the film to be quite long in the early stages of everything. As we’re given quite a lot of back-and-forth about the history of such treatments and how their own personal beliefs are affected, combined with all manner of other familiarity-breeding exercises between the group and the leader, it takes a while to get to the sleep-paralysis demon unleashed which can wear on the viewer when it takes halfway through the film before it even comes into play. As well as several slight scenes showcasing the low-budget origins on display, there here are the factors that hold this down.
Overview: ***.5/5
An enjoyable enough genre effort, that this one manages to overcome a lot of the flaws that emerge here manages to make this one a rather enjoyable effort for what it is. Those that appreciate this kind of indie effort or are curious about the subject matter will have a lot to like here while those that are turned off by the flaws should heed caution with this one.
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