Obsession
Rent/Purchase
After breaking the mysterious "One Wish Willow" to win his crush's heart, a hopeless romantic finds himself getting exactly what he asked for but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark, sinister price.
What critics thought
A horror film with a monkey's paw premise about romantic obsession, Obsession earns strong notices for its tonal balancing act — sadistic, funny, and genuinely unsettling at once — and for Inde Navarrette's physically and emotionally demanding lead performance. The main fault line in criticism is thematic: admirers see a sharp, crowd-pleasing genre film while skeptics argue it fumbles its ideas about female autonomy and male selfishness, reducing its heroine to a punchline rather than a perspective.
“proof that the Cregger-ification of 2020s horror is in full effect, as its combination of sadistic violence, ironic needle drops, and comedy mined from people responding to tragedy in pathetically self-serving ways will merit plenty of comparisons to Barbarian and Weapons”
Christian Zilko·IndieWire
“acing one of the more physically and emotionally taxing horror leads to come down the pike in a while”
Guy Lodge·Variety
“the human being trapped inside”
Katie Rife·RogerEbert.com
“tries to say something about female autonomy and male selfishness”
Odie Henderson·The Boston Globe
Genres
Horror
Cast & Crew
DirectorCurry Barker
StarringMichael Johnston, Inde Navarrette, Cooper Tomlinson, Megan Lawless, Andy Richter
ComposerRock Burwell
Obsession
After breaking the mysterious "One Wish Willow" to win his crush's heart, a hopeless romantic finds himself getting exactly what he asked for but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark, sinister price.
What critics thought
A horror film with a monkey's paw premise about romantic obsession, Obsession earns strong notices for its tonal balancing act — sadistic, funny, and genuinely unsettling at once — and for Inde Navarrette's physically and emotionally demanding lead performance. The main fault line in criticism is thematic: admirers see a sharp, crowd-pleasing genre film while skeptics argue it fumbles its ideas about female autonomy and male selfishness, reducing its heroine to a punchline rather than a perspective.
“proof that the Cregger-ification of 2020s horror is in full effect, as its combination of sadistic violence, ironic needle drops, and comedy mined from people responding to tragedy in pathetically self-serving ways will merit plenty of comparisons to Barbarian and Weapons”
Christian Zilko·IndieWire
“acing one of the more physically and emotionally taxing horror leads to come down the pike in a while”
Guy Lodge·Variety
“the human being trapped inside”
Katie Rife·RogerEbert.com
“tries to say something about female autonomy and male selfishness”
Odie Henderson·The Boston Globe
Genres
Horror
Cast & Crew
DirectorCurry Barker
StarringMichael Johnston, Inde Navarrette, Cooper Tomlinson, Megan Lawless, Andy Richter
ComposerRock Burwell
Rent/Purchase