Since elevated horror came out as a sought-after concept in the last decade, there have been made a lot of arthouse films in this subgenre. While some of them lingered closely to traditional horror tropes like jump-scare and spooky music, some films revolve around psychological tension and character depth.
A24 blazed the trail by distributing outstanding features such as "The Witch," "Lamb," "Saint Maud," "Midsommar," "Hereditary," "Men" and many more. By the look of things, this indie studio will continue to make a mark with new horror hits.
Their most recent offering, "Talk to Me" also captivated audiences with eerie vibes, brutal visuals and innovative approaches to cliche concepts like demonic possessions. The psychological thriller combines sobering themes with gore and violence.
This is the first motion picture directed by Danny and Michael Philippou, Australian twin brothers well-known for their YouTube channel RackaRacka. It seems like their passionate filmmaking process for their videos provided a lot of experience with directing, editing and stunting throughout their YouTube careers.
The successful production of the Philippou brothers under their own steam is redolent with Daniels, the director duo of "Everything Everywhere All At Once," which is another acquired taste from A24. It is sure as shooting that the Philippou twins will keep getting credits as well as Daniels.
The film mostly focuses on a wicked party game a group of friends gather to play with an embalmed hand covered in ceramic. This hand once belonged to a medium or a satanist who could contact the dead. Therefore, anyone can conjure the spirits from the other side by holding that hand and saying, "Talk to me."
Somehow, this haunted appendage goes viral through social media and starts to be passed around among curious teenagers, traveling from one person to the next. Mia, a young girl who is dealing with the recent loss of her mother, flings herself into the opportunity to connect with her loved one.
Hereby, she decides to have firsthand experience of this ritual with her friends. When the partygoers turn themselves over to fall into a trance and be possessed by the undead, the mystic board game inevitably gets out of hand.
"Talk to Me" gives the gang a rough ride through occult qualities and ghoulish incidents. Although the flow of events proceeds on a small scale it makes no concessions to creepiness and appalling sequences.
Besides the gruesome parts, the film can handle the psychological aspects of the plot as well. Oppression with grief and confronting traumas stand out as crucial themes. The paranormal terror targeting teenagers with gore and madness suggests that this movie puts a modern complexion on Sam Raimi’s "Evil Dead." On the other hand, the state of mourning for a parent and metaphysical manipulation specifically resembles Ari Aster’s "Hereditary." It is hard to say that "Talk to Me" could fare up to these horror classics, yet it successfully follows their example.
Danny Philippou, writer and co-director of the film, stated that it is a personal script that expresses grief, depression and loneliness as the core. That kind of fear and trauma show up as the key elements of horror in the story as much as the embalmed hand and unclean spirits.
Probably most of us do not know about the sense of fun in South Australia, but the representation of today’s youth and their reactions to the occult in the film seem to have a worldwide accuracy. The use of supernatural artifacts for entertainment takes place as a realistic concept here, as it always has been in this genre. It follows the same trends as Ouija board games and "Bloody Mary" that have caught on with various cultures for generations.
However, "Talk to Me" brings a variation on the theme of escapism. The hand becomes an allegory for harmful habits acquired by teenagers falling into the wrong hands to evade their issues. Even their appearances under the influence of spirits evoke the state of drug addicts. Despite the precautions taken with a time limit of 90 seconds for each seance, getting off light was never possible after all.
Mia (Sophie Wilde) is in the eye of the storm since she couldn’t save her own neck from the other side. She falls prey to evil entities because of the suffering from her family tragedy, but Mia is not the only one being cursed with unwanted guests. As a last resort, she has to take their lives in her hands to save her friends from the eternal agony once and for all.
Though the task seems like an impossible burden, Sophie Wilde shines as the leading star through her soulful performances. The rest of the cast is also in the good hands of young talent such as Joe Bird, Alexandra Jensen and Otis Dhanji, with Chris Aloiso and Zoe Terakes in the company of Miranda Otto as a celebrity figure and more experienced actress.
As the ways of wordplay with hands run short and there is nothing else to say, now is the time to wrap up. Obviously, it’s too early to claim that "Talk to Me" is the best horror of the year, since fall just arrived with a bunch of new candidates. But still, it’s a new-found gem of cast and directors.
