☆ ☆ ☆ ½
Talk to Me (2022) – D. Philippou & M. Philippou
Not for the squeamish.
Australian horror film with high concept premise: when you hold the severed
hand of a dead medium and utter the title phrase, horrible spirits from limbo
are able to enter and control your body.
The film’s teen protagonists treat this experience as a sort of party
drug (and clearly that’s the central metaphor here) with the same sort of
unpredictable (and often dire) outcomes. Often unbelievably tense – and bloody –
and perhaps veering toward the torture porn films that I’ve successfully
avoided (i.e., Saw franchise). Sophie Wilde plays Mia, the unstable girl who
has recently lost her mother and who gets sucked into the world of the severed
hand. She’s more-or-less adopted by the
central family here, headed by single mum (?), Miranda Otto. Although the film
falters a bit in its final act (messing with us about what is or is not real),
things mostly stay coherent as we hurtle to the inevitable final scene. Great premise though.
