It's What's Inside - Movie Review

The Movie: It's What's Inside

The Director: Greg Jardin

The Cast: Brittany O'Grady, James Morosini, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Devon Terrell, Gavin Leatherwood, Reina Hardesty, Nina Bloomgarden, David W. Thompson

The Story: A group of friends gather for a pre-wedding party that descends into an existential nightmare when an estranged friend arrives with a mysterious game that awakens long-hidden secrets, desires, and grudges.

The Rating: 6 / 10

The Review:

Okay, so this movie made a lot of noise at this year's Sundance Film Festival, probably because it's got that edgy vibe that festival audiences eat up while caught up in all the hype. For me, watching it on Netflix, it felt like it was trying really, really hard to be the cool kid instead of just being the cool kid. Sure, the movie is entertaining but it's lacking in originality and ends up going completely off the rails by the time it's over.

The look and vibe of the movie really reminds me of 2018's Climax by Gaspar Noé, mainly the visual style and plummet into mayhem which ultimately caused me a fair amount of anger and frustration. To be fair, that's what Noé shoots for as a director so I give him credit for that whereas my frustration with this movie is in its inability to find an ending and leaving me wondering if that was intentional or if the whole thing is a setup for a future continuation.

Another problem I had with this movie is that no one is likeable in any way so it was impossible to root for or even have any sort of empathy for any of the characters. Yes, I understand that's intentional but it doesn't make it any easier. All that being said, I think a lot of people are going to really like this movie because of it's wild, science fiction leaning concept that does ask a few legitimate questions about who we are, how we perceive ourselves, and how oblivious we are to the ways other people perceive us.

Ultimately, I think Netflix was a good place for this movie to land since way more people will be willing to check it out than if it had been released in the theaters and that's more a commentary on what the industry has done to bury movie theaters than it is about the movie itself. You should definitely watch this movie, it has a lot of really fun moments, I just think it also has a lot of flaws and the ending especially was a total mess.