Obsession

Simpsons did it..?

Written and Directed by: Curry Barker
Cast: Michael Johnston, Inde Navarrette, Cooper Tomlinson, Megan Lawless

Full disclosure: I walked into this one with my large cherry Icee and pretty much zero expectations. I’d been following director Curry Barker on social media for years, got sucked into the TikTok marketing rabbit hole (judge me, I don’t care), and thought… okay, at best this is a solid mid-tier horror flick. I’ll enjoy it, forget it by next week. That’s not what happened.

Obsession opens fast. No bloated backstory, no unnecessary setup. Bear (Johnston) is a guy with a longtime crush on his childhood friend and coworker Nikki (Navarrette). During one of their usual late-night phone calls, Nikki drops her crystal necklace down the drain. Bear, being the guy he is, goes out to find her a replacement. What he comes across instead is a novelty toy called the “One Wish Willow,” which he grabs thinking it might make a fun gift. Later that night, he misses his shot with Nikki, says forget it, and breaks the thing himself, wishing that Nikki loves him more than anyone in the entire world. Simple premise. Big mistake.

What follows is about an hour and twenty minutes of genuinely unsettling storytelling that crawls under your skin and stays there. There’s a particular feeling this film creates… that uncanny valley dread where you can’t quite place what’s wrong, but something is very, very wrong. If you’ve seen Hereditary or Midsommar and loved the way those films made your brain sprint ahead only to deliver something worse than what you imagined, this is that kind of movie. I caught myself thinking “okay, here’s where X happens” multiple times. I was wrong every time, and what actually happened was worse. I would describe more of the story, but I really think people just need to see it for themselves. 

Navarrette is really outstanding here. It would have been easy to play Nikki as just… creepy. A horror movie weirdo who exists to scare people. That’s not what she does. The scenes where Nikki is just a normal woman who knows her coworker has a crush on her are just as important as the unhinged ones, and she nails both. There’s a moment near the climax where she recites what I can only describe as the most deeply disturbing poem I’ve ever heard delivered in a movie theater. The entire audience audibly lost it. That’s the kind of scene that reminds you why horror works when it’s written well.

Another thing I wasn’t expecting to say here is: Johnston as Bear is equally essential. His genuine, escalating fear is what makes all of it land. Without a real, grounded reaction from the person at the center of this nightmare, Nikki’s performance floats. He anchors it. And the supporting cast, specifically Sarah (Lawless) and Ian (Tomlinson), who could have easily been background noise, serve as strong connective tissue to the real world. They matter in this film.

The fact that this came from a first-time feature director working on a budget under a million dollars is the part that genuinely impressed me.

The sound design, the lighting, the writing… none of it feels cheap. Barker clearly knows what he’s doing. Fun fact: He was inspired by a Simpsons episode featuring a monkey’s paw, and that origin story tracks. There’s a darkly comic sensibility woven through the horror that keeps it from ever feeling mean-spirited for no reason.

I went in for a mid-tier horror movie night out. I left wondering if I was going to have nightmares. That’s not something I say often, and I’ve seen a lot of horror films, including a lot of truly forgettable ones. This one is different. It’s worth the theater ticket, full stop. I haven’t been to the theater in honestly years now but Curry Barker being my reason to show up, and him delivering something this good was a nice surprise. This is the kind of filmmaking debut you remember. Good enough for me to come out of hiatus and write a new FG review!

Obsession is the rare horror film that earns its hype. Smart writing, a powerhouse lead performance, and the kind of dread that makes you double take dark corners for days. One of the best horror films in recent memory, and it was made for less than a million dollars! See it in theaters while you can.