RED ROOMS (2023)

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"We see you. And you are obscene."

Damn.

My roommate had already seen this one, and didn't consider it a horror film. But she's quite wrong about that, because RED ROOMS absolutely is a horror film. It's not a slasher. It's not supernatural. It's not even a Giallo.  It's not horror by any standard of measurement that most people would use, but it's a horror film all the same. Deeply psychological, and deeply riveting, it's very rare that a horror film reaches out, grabs me, draws me in and holds me there the way RED ROOMS did.

Sure, I wasn't frightened in the way that I was when I watched Steven Soderbergh's 2018 thriller UNSANE a few marathons back. No, that one managed to shake me because of the 1-2 punch of it's very immersive presentation, and the fact that I didn't realize that I had a fear of involuntary commitment until I watched it. I didn't realize that until I noticed how hard my my chest was quivering with anxiety, how dry my throat had become, how hard I was gripping my chair, and so I paused to collect myself, and once I realized why I was so afraid I was able to proceed. 

But RED ROOMS did shake me up and make me somewhat anxious and very uncomfortable in its final act, and it kept me glued to the screen, eyes wide and mouth slightly agape, and it disturbed me with a shot so outrageous in context that I dare not spoil it here. Not via still, not via text. If you want to know, you're going to have to watch with your own eyes. 

As a related aside, I openly confess to having an interest in true-crime. This interest started when I was younger, with a passing interest in serial killers like Jack The Ripper, and outrageous, deadly crimes, like the kidnapping and subsequent murder of Charles Lindbergh Jr. In college I briefly studied criminal justice, with an emphasis on criminal investigation and also criminal psychology. Ultimately, I sussed out the fact that such choices would eventually lead me down a path where I would see things that I would never be able to unsee, and that I didn't want such things to cleave themselves into my mind where they would undoubtedly keep me up at night. I've never since regretted that course-correction. 

Still, the interest remains, but it comes in phases like any other interest I have. Sometimes I'll indulge that passing curiosity via Reddit, or YouTube channels like "That Chapter," where I'll read or watch for a week or two before moving on to something else entirely for months at a time. In today's world, I can only stomach so much information about depravity before I need a respite. There is, after all, only so much doom that one can take, particularly when we're awash in it.

However, there are those who's interest transcends occasional curiosity and eventually blossoms into full-blown obsession, and that's what RED ROOMS is about. 

RED ROOMS is the story of a Montreal woman named Kelly-Anne. She's statuesque and beautiful, a model who only gets paid to have her picture taken as a side gig. Her main sources of income? Investing in Bitcoin and playing online Poker "professionally." She makes more than enough to pay for her high-rise apartment, to hone her considerable computer and internet expertise, and even train the AI of her only regular companion, her Alexa-like digital assistant, Guinevere. 

Despite her success, Kelly-Anne seems empty, taciturn, and obsessive. We meet her as she camps out overnight in order to get in the door early to observe the trial of accused serial-murderer Ludovic Chevalier, who has allegedly tortured and murdered 3 young girls for profit via streaming the carnage on the dark web in a so-called "Red Room." If sleeping in an alley on the lip of a loading-dock just to be the first in line for the trial of an accused triple-murderer screams "red flag" to you, congrats, you're reasonably sane. 

The trial is highly sensationalized, the talk of the press, the event on everyone's lips. And as is the case in real-life, it draws in not only the tabloid-hungry masses who can't get enough of the 24-hour news-cycle, but also women who are locked in an unhealthy parasocial relationship with the accused. Kelly-Anne is one of these women, as is Clementine, a young woman who came to Montreal because of her obsession with Chevalier, and who strikes up a friendship with Kelly-Anne. She serves as a stark contrast to the withdrawn and reserved Kelly-Anne. She's a compact powder-keg, full of vigor and righteous outrage, talkative and so obviously hungry for connection and companionship. 

Their presence at the proceedings does not go unnoticed by Francine Beaulieu, the grieving mother of the youngest victim, Camille Beaulieu, a woman who is convinced of Chevalier's guilt and determined to see him convicted. In one sequence, she calls out Chevalier's groupies during a press-conference, saying, "We see you. And you are obscene." 

Yeah, she might as well be addressing us directly. 

As the movie proceeds, we'll find that Kelly-Anne and Clementine are obsessed with the trial of Chevalier for different reasons: Clementine is there because she feels a connection with the accused killer and is convinced of his innocence. But Kelly-Anne? She's there (at least in part) because she's the ultimate embodiment of the online true-crime sleuth who consumes the stories of cruelty and murder and ultimately longs to make themselves a part of the story. Her dogged obsession to do exactly that will lead her to becoming ever more daring, more outrageous, and more self-destructive in the process as she escalates again and again, and drags us along for the ride.

This film hinges on the performances of these three women, Kelly-Anne (Juliette Gariépy), Clementine (Laurie Babin), and Francine Beaulieu (Élisabeth Locas), because this film draws its power from the actions of this trio of women. So many other, more exploitative films lean heavily upon the depictions of violence, but writer/director Pascal Plante has woven a tale that manages to shake and affect you by declining to do that. All it shows us is some of the aftermath, while haunting us with some effective sounds of mayhem accompanied by the screams and sobs of its victims. HOSTEL this is not, and it sure as hell isn't MEGAN IS MISSING. Sometimes less is more, and what you don't see is more horrific than what you can be shown. Here the characters are the crux, their story, their actions are what compels, and all three actors absolutely bring the goods. Juliette Gariépy is absolutely magnetic, and she deservedly won the Prix Iris for "Revelation of the Year" at the 25th Quebec Cinema Awards in 2023, and was a co-winner for the "Best Performance" at the 2023 Fantasia Film Festival (shared with Nathan Stewart-Jarrett). 

I could say so much more, but I just won't do that because I'll be damned if I spoil anything important for those who wish to watch. Plus, so many other reviewers have covered these themes much better than I can. 

And there's a definite caveat here. This film is not for everyone, largely because it requires the viewer to commit to paying attention. I found this easy because the material is so compelling, but some will find that to be a challenge. Secondly, you have to be comfortable with ambiguity, or at the very least be willing to weather your discomfort with uncertainty, because there are some answers you're going to have find on your own. This is not a film that holds your hand. 

RED ROOMS holds a mirror up to our culture, and the reflection is not flattering. It's an illustration of how our voyeuristic hunger for horror and anguish leads us to broadcast and sensationalize atrocity, thereby normalizing it. And as we gawk and gape at the results, we rationalize and dissociate from the horror of the acts themselves, and avoid reckoning with our own complicity. 

"If it bleeds, it leads" is a media trope, but its also a truism, and reports of ghastly crimes have sold many a newspaper, secured many a ratings bonanza on television, and generated countless clicks online. It's rubbernecking for the masses, blood on the highway, on the sidewalk, on the floor, or soaking into the dirt, or caked onto the lining of a car boot. Blood on the page and on the screens of our TVs, our PC monitors, and our tablet and smart phone screens. 

Blood? Don't look now, but you're soaking in it. 

Five. Fucking. Stars. (*****), HIGHLY recommended.