Directed By Curry Barker
Starring – Michael Johnston, Inde Navarrette, Cooper Tomlinson
The Plot – After breaking the mysterious “One Wish Willow” to win his crush’s heart, hopeless romantic, Bear (Johnston) finds himself getting exactly what he asked for but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark, sinister price.
Rated R for strong bloody violence, grisly images, sexual content, pervasive language, and brief graphic nudity.
POSITIVES
No genre falls victimized prey to the overinflated expectations and underwhelmed results of hyperbole more than horror, as a result of the diversity of its creatively expanding grasp refusing to cater to one enveloping definition, and while Obsession certainly received its fair share of premeditated hype, it elates me to express that this is a movie that lives up to nearly every square inch of its prolonged pressure, with a breakthrough feature length directorial debut for Curry Barker that instantly sends him into the stratosphere of horror’s next generation of morbid visionaries. The kind of expressive wings that Barker lends so feverishly to the engagement can be measured in every single frame, interaction, or performance paid to the proceeding, but specifically its the unapologetically bleak and hopeless atmosphere conjured towards contemporary dating that not only unloads hypocritical commentary in the shifted power dynamics that requires male audiences to endure every handcrafted line or artificially enacted emotion that they’ve unabashedly delivered at one point or another throughout their lives, but also the incredible grasp over the material, which tonally is paid off so engagingly accessible with a rich combination of horror and comedy, the likes of which permeate so effortlessly intoxicating together that they never allow one to compromise the necessary influence of the other. Thematically, Barker certainly taps into elements of toxic dating and co-dependency as the motivational means to explore dark depravity within this manufactured coupling, specifically this palpable underlining element of tragedy that permeates accordingly with Nikki’s dreaded dispositioning, despite her actions evidently making her the story’s depended antagonist, but like the layers of an onion, the screenplay eventually sheds itself to tap into elements of male fragility and the terrifying boundaries between love and total, violent possession, all while encompassing this cautionary tale playing into the ages old sentiment to be careful what you wish for, and considering the results spawn a consistency for experience that chilled me with uncanny reminder of some of my worst relationships, with the levity of some off-beat caustic wit between moments of prolonged awkwardness between its conflicted characters, I found myself clamoring for every minute spent alongside such a corrosively uncontrollable dynamic, a feat that’s remarkable in its own right when you consider how many on-screen toxic relationships have detracted significantly from my experiences with romantic comedies over the past decade. Obsession is certainly no romantic comedy, but Barker’s aforementioned caustic wit does invoke some triggered sensibilities to the subgenre that spoof elements like music montages, first dates, and emotional intimacy, with the required satirical sting to utilize them in the depths of horror commendably, with just enough self-aware outlining to elicit a tongue in cheek wink and nod to the audience who have been forced to endure them in multiples, and while it’s just a small example of the grander picture that plays all the more vividly towards hilarity with the increasingly elevated stakes of Nikki’s unrelenting grasp, the unavoidable discomfort and emasculating allows for plenty of opportunity to react emotionally in those pocketed quiet moments of gauging between its characters, where laughs or even shrieks of unfiltered tension from its audience seem reactionary par for the course in a film so constantly unpredictable, particularly in how it saves its loudest impacts for a climax when they can be felt the loudest. Aside from Barker’s impressive helming at merely 26 years of age, some of the weight of responsibility is taken off of his stoic shoulders with atmospheric ambiance in the marriage of sight and sound, between Taylor Clemons ominously unnerving cinematography, and Rock Burwell’s eerily ambient score, establishing a precedent in the presentation as quickly as the opening sequence involving a slow and steady screen scroll. Clemons’ utilizing of low-key lighting, shadow play and intentionally obtrusive framing techniques undeniably elicit an uncontrollable panic and paranoia towards visuals that we can’t always read with defining clarity, but it’s truly his 4:3 aspect ratio over the entirety of the presentation that crafts a boxed-in and claustrophobic feel to the inescapability of these tensely uncomfortable situations, and Burwell, while coinciding alongside Indi Navarrette’s disturbing performance, does plenty of heavy lifting to ratchet the manic energies of scenes and sequences continuously reveling in the mania of the maniacal, featuring plenty of dreamily nightmarish synth-executed compositions and expansive versatility in the evolving tones and tempos of the themes that make it the measuring stick of scores to beat in 2026. Likewise, while the practicality of the effects used in the film do create some noticeable distractions to their enacting, Barker as a filmmaker is someone who has absolutely no qualms about digging deep into gruesomely disgusting imagery, in order to ratchet pay-offs corresponding with character responses, with grotesque gore earning enough an unforgettable influence despite the minimizing of its usage keeping this from ever feeling shamelessly exploitative on the same scale as something like the Terrifier movies. Outside of one sequence involving vehicular smashing, and perhaps an unseen cat death during the opening scene, I don’t think there’s anything too devilishly detailed in the depiction to feel stomach-churning towards the vulnerabilities of a sensitive audience, though enough of a maintained consistency to remind you of its R-rating, where a little bit of enough kept me on the edge of my seat with a character as uncontrollably unpredictable as Nikki doing the devastating. Speaking of Nikki, the performances around the board are incredible from this limited ensemble, but none more prominent than Indi Navarrette, who commands the screen with a tour de force takeover that is nothing short of star-making. Navarrette’s autopiloted monotony during the somber moments of her possessed influence from Bear’s wish certainly articulates an absence of consciousness that contextualizes Nikki’s transformative captivity, with spontaneous moments of zealous responses of the soul seeking to shine through, but her grandest gestures are those in the ways she conveys the nervous ticks and emotional immaturity of Nikki’s obvious insecurities, where the actress contorts her face or utilizes her eyes to dig deeper into the uncontrollable rage that permeates like a rising inferno beneath the surface, and while her exaggerated responses can certainly feel comedic under the right kind of surreal light, it doesn’t take away from the limitless commitment that Navarrette dons in making the film such a memorable success, where everyone and everything else orbits around her gravitational pull on the film. While Navarrette is undeniably the star of this showcase, I want to show some love to Michael Johnston, whose equally insightful eyes and overwhelmed responses serve as the perfect gauging measurement for Nikki’s destructive tendencies, where his shocking expressions and ensuing vulnerability not only makes the fear in his performance feel all the more palpable, but also enriches the depth of the chemistry between these characters in ways that transcends the briefness of their dating history, cementing an selflessly splendid straight man approach that carries the slack during those rare moments when Nikki isn’t on-screen.
NEGATIVES
Barker and his production have plenty going for it, in order to make Obsession the best horror film of 2026, but there are some overlooked aspects to the execution that articulate his inferiority as a writer when compared to his near perfect directing, inside of a screenplay that doesn’t dig deep enough to utilize all of the potential of its uniquely fascinating gimmick. I can wholeheartedly understand leaving plenty unexplored with the wish gimmick itself, as sequel opportunities certainly present themselves with limitless possibilities in spades, however the unfulfilling aspects that I’m talking about pertain more to Nikki’s backstory as a character, with some introduced aspects pertaining to a lukewarm relationship to her father and a writing career, that are never pursued with the kind of depth to transcend its surface level dissecting, leaving the character feeling like a device for Bear, instead of one made all the more tragic by some unforeseen force that takes over her life and ambitions in the blink of an eye. Even the gimmick itself could use a little more smoothing out, as we’re never exactly told why Nikki’s transformation is so frightening, when Bear simply just requested that she love him more than anyone else in the universe. If he would’ve expressed that she be obsessed with him, then I would’ve understood her darkly devastating demeanor, but she’s simply just evil for the sake of being evil, and the moral ambiguity left me wish plenty of more questions than answers, especially once we start to shed some light into what comes of the old Nikki when the new one takes over. Beyond the script’s lack of pursuit at some of its more fascinating components, the effects work of some ambitious sequences also detracted significantly on the movie’s appeal, with some glaringly hollow and artificial techniques that convey the budgetary limitations of a Blumhouse-led production. One such example pertains to Nikki walking backwards in a spontaneous knee jerk reaction to a response from Bear, where it’s so painfully obvious that the film is being run in reverse, instead of allowing Navarrette the freedom to attempt the exercise herself, while another moment involves a character meeting their untimely death, featuring the worst kind of editing out between actor and dummy, with a completely different interactive weight and influence over the actor steering them, and though this ultimately won’t be a problem for audiences reveling in the campiness of Barker’s established humor, it kept me from appreciating each frame of the movie’s most expressive opportunities, leaving me wishing that these moments were edited better, in order to override some of the glaring transparencies.
OVERALL
Obsession is a skin-crawling, nerve-rattling cautionary tale about twisted love, that not only cements Curry Barker as the next big thing in the revolving door of horror auteurs, but also one with enough confidence to make its audience laugh every bit as much as it makes them squirm. Led by an unhinged performance from Indi Navarrette, ominously unnerving production values, and an unapologetically bleak outlook on contemporary romance, that grows all the more darker, creepier, and bloodier, with each passing minute, the film capitalizes on the magnitude of its monumental hype with the theatrical kind of experience worthy of the largest crowds, cementing a wish come true for horror hounds who have waited patiently for that one that changes everything
My Grade: 8.7 or A-