Backrooms: Movie Review

Cast:  Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Mark Duplass, Finn Bennett, and Lukita Maxwell.
Director: Kane Parsons

The latest psychological horror to hit screens comes from the director of a viral web series exploring the existential fear of spaces and transitions, as well as the whole Creepypasta vibe.

When furniture store owner Clark (Ejiofor) discovers a series of rooms in his store that he wasn't aware of before, he starts to explore. But after his therapist (Sentimental Value's Reinsve) discovers he's missing, she sets out to find him.

In  many ways, Backrooms is best experienced unspoiled. It's a film that's destined to be dissected, debated and done to death with screenshots as online forums pore over every single visual clue and comment.

There's a distinctly unsettling edge to the 90s set story and visuals with found footage vibes meshing nicely with sly nods to the past, via way of Creepypasta-style dread and unease.

But it's a little obtuse at times, giving non-fans a workout in terms of what's happening. However, what proves to be most effective during the atmospheric film's unsettling aesthetic is the contortions of memory, the dread of empty space and the unending hum of lights buzzing away.

The liminal horror genre is prone to using slave to unsettle and Parsons peppers much of the environments with carefully disturbing imagery, a loop of visuals and mirror images twisting what you see.

Like the first Paranormal Activity film where the home camera swept from side to side, Parsons makes great fist of his spatial sets and unending corridors with shadowy elements lurking in the background. It's easy to see where Severance got its inspiration from.

But while the visuals provide the nightmare fuel, both Eijofor and Reinsve tap into the existential dread of their characters with ease, even if direct answers aren't coming and opacity clouds proceedings.

For Reinsve's therapist,it's looping memories of the loss of the family home that rattle her carefully structured solo world. And for Eijofor's Clark, it's the frustration of how his life went from architect to crummy furniture salesman, left by his wife.

If Parsons does much to expand his shorts series, it's by design. A slow burn throughout builds up to very little, but with mono-yellow vistas and droning hums if lights, the film's high on its own atmosphere.

But by focusing on just two characters and placing them in worlds that challenge their beliefs, he creates a vision that's deeply haunting and one which will never allow you in future to look at an empty corridor without some kind of dread.