Director: Danishka Esterhazy
Year: 2025
Country: South Africa
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature
Plot:
Desperate to find a date, a woman makes a match on a dating app with a stranger who seems to be a potential beau, only to fall prey to his domineering mother in a plan to provide women for her grotesquely deformed son as a potential mate, and must find a way to get out alive.
Review:
Overall, this was an intriguing if somewhat problematic genre effort. Among the better elements present here come from the startlingly strong and effective central setup, which gives the film some incredibly fun momentum to start this off. The idea of using a topical and very modern form of concept where the dating app is used to lure people over to the house for what appears to be dates only for it to be a setup by the mother to get victims for the hulking deformity of her son to do what he pleases with them under the hope of providing a grandchild for his mother is a rather fun concept. This idea is handled with a lot of ideal connotations about catfishing in modern dating and how that’s landed her in this situation as all of the usual tropes of the situation come into play here, featuring the expected rushing into plans without correlating everything with others, failing to vet anything said online with other sources, and making every effort to conceal your identity to those around you.
As this serves the film well enough to get the girl into the house, once there, it provides enough of a background so that the other elements on display have some intensity behind them. The initial meeting between her and the monstrous offspring in the house offers a genuinely frightening setup and scenario with the way it plays out as she’s completely unsure of the situation and is slowly brought into something far beyond what she’s expected, mainly through how they keep her confined in the house for breeding purposes with her hulking son chasing her around the complex trying to make it with her. The scenes in the darkened hallways and corpse-riddled rooms as the imposing figure plans to take care of his reproductive needs, only to then turn it into a series of stalking and chases around the house that bring about some enjoyable moments alongside the sleazy happenings, with the relationship being explored to give the film a lot to like.
There are some issues here. The main element that holds this one down is the immensely irritating and generally frustrating stupidity present within here that tends to keep them in danger more than anything. After gaining the upper hand in numerous situations and doing nothing but allowing them to continue pursuing the girl because she refuses to take the initiative when she can, this prolongs the film's runtime, given the nature of the interactions present. Even under the guise of various injuries and threats to her personal safety isn’t enough to change it up, much less get her to make more expedient decisions on how to fight back, as everything she does is passive with how the interactions take place, again making the whole thing feel longer than it should. Alongside some obvious parts where it’s hard to believe the inner workings of the house are genuine, these do hold it back the most.
Overview: ****/5
A really solid and fun genre effort, there’s quite a lot to like here that keeps this going with enjoyable factors to hold it off against a few small issues that are present in holding it back. Those with an interest in this kind of style or approach, or who are fans of the creative crew, will have a lot to like here, while those turned off by those factors should heed caution.
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