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The Big Picture

• Talk to Me is a possession movie that explores the themes of grief, guilt, and peer pressure, showing how one decision can shatter lives.
• The film maintains a sense of dread throughout, building tension as the main character deteriorates mentally and becomes consumed by her mother's death.
• Despite not relying heavily on gore, Talk to Me effectively uses minimal but impactful gore scenes to evoke strong emotions and create a devastating impact.

When I was about ten years old, I watched Trick ‘r Treat with my parents as part of a countdown to Halloween. It was my first experience with horror films, and it’s a damn good one, in my humble opinion. However, at ten, it had me absolutely terrified. Check behind every shower curtain, scared to walk down dark hallways, climb into bed with your parents absolutely terrified. Maybe at the time, I was a little too young to realize that it wasn’t real, and thus the thought of vengeful lake zombies and Little Red Riding Hood ripping off her skin to become the Big Bad Wolf had me shaking in my boots. However, after seeing Trick ‘r Treat once, I found myself drawn to it again and again. Over time, it didn’t scare me anymore, but it found a special place in my heart as I sought out more and more horror media. You never forget your first, as they say.

Since then, I’ve found that horror is a genre that I generally like. I have favorite themes and favorite subgenres — most notably body horror and medical gore — but I’ll give most horror movies at least one watch. However, they don’t normally get to me anymore. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned how to separate fiction and reality in a way I couldn’t when I watched my first horror movie. Some might argue that this means that the horror I watch isn’t effective; I completely disagree. Horror, like any other genre, is expansive. Not every action blockbuster or period piece is going to move you to tears with its grandiosity. Some of it is trash, and trash can be fun. Middle-of-the-road stuff is great too. It all has its place, and in horror especially, I think it makes the pieces that do strike a nerve so much more meaningful.

I’m 24 at the time of writing this. It’s taken over a decade for me to have that gut-wrenching, heart-pounding feeling caused by a horror film again. And with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer to the teeth, that nerve was struck as I sat in a theater watching Talk to Me a few months ago. This time, though, it wasn’t quite the same kind of fear I had watching Trick ‘r Treat as a child. Regardless, I left the theater f’cked up beyond belief. So much so that I actually left my wallet behind in my haste to get the hell out of there. That’s one walk of shame I’m not eager to repeat.

Talk to Me

When a group of friends discover how to conjure spirits using an embalmed hand, they become hooked on the new thrill, until one of them goes too far and unleashes terrifying supernatural forces.

What Is 'Talk to Me' About?

Talk to Me is currently the fifth highest-grossing A24 film of all time, pulling in $91M at the global box office. It's already been praised as one of the — if not the —best horror films of 2023 due to excellent performances from its cast (in particular Sophie Wilde as Mia) great cinematography, and frights that rely on so much more than blood, guts, and jump scares. With all this success, it's no surprise that the film has already been greenlit for a sequel that will continue to explore the strange hand and the way it possesses those who hold it.

The story centers around Mia (Sophie Wilde), a girl struggling with the death of her mother. She spends most of her time at her friend Jade’s (Alexandra Jensen) house and shares a close connection with Jade’s little brother, Riley (Joe Bird). One night, Mia tags along to a party hosted by two schoolmates, Hayley (Zoe Terakes) and Joss (Chris Alosio), who have been posting videos online of people seemingly possessed after touching a strange hand. She gets her chance to try it out and finds a thrill in being in the throes of possession.

Eager to try again, she and Jade hold a party of their own, this time with Riley and one of his friends tagging along. Wanting to join in despite his fear, Riley asks for a turn using the hand. After some protest, his request is granted by Mia, as long as they only allow the possession to last 60 seconds instead of the usual 90. However, it’s no longer fun and games as Riley appears to be possessed by the ghost of Mia’s mother. He goes far over the 90-second limit and begins harming himself, banging his head against the table and trying to pull his own eye out (in on of the most disturbing scenes committed to film).

This causes a major rift between Mia and Jade’s family. Now, Mia becomes paranoid, seeing spirits all around her even when not using the hand. She must figure out what happened to her mother and find a way to save Riley — lest his soul be tormented forever. I know, I know. It’s a pretty standard possession plot. You’re probably asking yourself what exactly got me in such a tizzy. I want to preface this by saying that it wasn’t screaming and jumping-out-of-your-seat terror I was feeling; it was non-stop crying, sick-to-my-stomach fear. This movie made me feel ugly inside in a way that had me physically sick. And as far as horror movies go, that's a good thing.

'Talk to Me' Maintains a Sense of Dread Right Until the End

Talk to Me is a possession movie, but not strictly in the supernatural sense. It is about how grief and guilt can consume you whole. It’s about how peer pressure can overtake your own feelings and mental compasses. It’s about how one decision can shatter your life. The movie wants us to know that we’re fragile, that all it takes is one thing to put us on the edge and make every subsequent thing threaten to push us off. This is something that I believe makes the film work so well, especially for a viewer like me, who doesn't typically enjoy possession horror. Possession is almost never truly about the supernatural; ghosts and demons are almost always manifestations of more human things like guilt, suffering, loneliness, and, in the case of Talk to Me, peer pressure and corruption.

I think, in a sense, it was a smart move to make Riley the example of peer pressure in the film. Riley is the youngest character, one that still crawls into bed with his sister or Mia when he is scared. He feels innocent and naive, and we see he’s almost desperate to seek out that thing he’s scared of, both because of his own curiosity and to seem cool, as kids often do. I’m the big brother to five siblings, and I’ve seen each and every one of them do this. They watch things too scary for them. They do stupid things to impress their friends. Perhaps that’s why Riley’s part in the movie gutted me. The moment I saw him grab the hand, my heart dropped. I’ve seen enough horror movies, and played enough horror games, to know that he’s not safe. He’s not going to be like the others, who were laughing and smiling at this party trick. No, he’s going to be the example. The person who gets sick or dies because of some viral trend.

Talk to Me is fantastic at setting up that sense of dread. It never goes away during the film; it just keeps building. As we see Mia begin to deteriorate, it builds. It builds with each thought of her mother saying that killing Riley is the only way to save him. It builds each time she touches a knife. You have to ask yourself “She won’t really do it, right?” There’s no point in this movie when things are comfortable, and I think that’s a good thing. You aren’t supposed to be comfortable. You’re supposed to watch as Mia is forced to confront her mother, again and again, knowing that something isn’t right, but also that Mia is a young girl stuck in a loop of twisted hope. She hopes she can continue to see her mother and get answers. She hopes she can save Riley, who has become her family, a new safe haven. Grief is a cycle that can continue to ruin your relationships if not handled, and Talk to Me portrays that well by showing how the death of Mia’s mother has taken over her life to the point that she is willing to put Riley in danger just for the chance to talk to her. And it may not have actually been her.

This is a film that wants to play with your mind more than anything. It wants you to be scared of the real things in it: death, grief, guilt, social pressure, pain. Seeing this group of young people, people who you’d normally call stupid and make fun of in a B slasher, be legitimately fleshed out and treated like people, makes Talk to Me hit harder. It’s seeing a big sister feel responsible for her little brother’s injuries, her guilt eating away at her because she should have stayed with him. It’s the solemn group after Riley’s incident, unsure of what to do, because they were just having fun, nothing was supposed to go wrong. It’s Mia, knowing if she had just snapped out of it, if she hadn’t made it go on so long, he’d still be okay. It’s the desperation, the longing, to see a loved one again, and to hear that it wasn’t your fault. To be allowed to say goodbye. It’s the chasing of a high that can’t possibly crash because it’s just a game. It’s just a challenge. It’s not real. Right?

Does 'Talk to Me' Have a Lot of Gore?

I was fortunate enough to see an advanced screening that had a Q and A with Talk to Me’s directors, Danny Philippou and Michael Philippou. One of the questions they were asked was about the gore in the film, particularly regarding one scene that showed Riley tortured by the spirits. It’s rather brief, but in their answer, the directors admit that the scene was originally over two minutes long. They decided to cut it down because they felt like it was gore for gore’s sake, and wanted to avoid that in the film. It was the right move as there’s only a bit of gore here and there, but when it appears, it’s impactful.

Honestly, my sick stomach during the film didn’t come from the gore. Blood and guts and injuries are par for the course with many horror films, and I don’t usually find myself disturbed by it beyond a mumbled “damn, that’s rowdy!” while watching. It was the way the gore was used. The scene where Riley is possessed and begins slamming his head against the table, trying to split his head open and pulling out his own eye didn’t make me feel grossed out. It made me feel sad. As soon as his head made contact with the table, I couldn’t hold back my tears. My chest hurt. It was seeing Riley bloody and bruised, seeing everyone around him trying to make him stop hurting himself, that just got to me in a way no horror movie has lately. I'm pretty sure I scared the guy sitting in the seat next to me in the theater with the way I had to hold back my sobs, but I couldn't help it. Talk to Me f***ed up my mind in a way most horror movies don't by putting on a wildly raw display that I hadn't expected from the film going in.

I genuinely believe that Talk to Me worked because it didn’t rely on gore to scare the audience. Had there been too much, its plot and themes would have been drowned out by it. The way it's used so sparingly, purposely meaningful instead of thrown in for a cheap scare, made sure that you knew it was out of the norm. What happens to Riley is sudden and strange and scary and sad. Talk to Me uses that mix of emotion to its advantage, and I think that’s ultimately what got to me. It doesn't want you to just be scared; it wants you to be devastated.

And for me, at least, it got the job done.

Talk to Me is available to rent on Prime Video.

Rent on Prime Video

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