In one of the first important scenes of Talk to Me, teenage Mia (Sophie Wilde) and her best friend’s little brother Riley (Joe Bird) encounter a dying kangaroo on the side of the road. Believing there’s nothing veterinary attention can do, Riley encourages Mia to put it out of its misery. This sentiment echoes later in the film in a darkly ironic context; and the theme of euthanasia -killing something out of the impression of preventing suffering- hangs over the movie in disturbing implication. Mia does decide not to run the kangaroo over by the way, but her trauma over the incident lasts nonetheless.
Talk to Me appears to be a real “little movie that could”. Funded through Screen Australia and the Adelaide Film Festival and directed by first-time filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippou, who worked on The Babadook and host a YouTube channel called RackaRacka -it previewed in Adelaide last year before coming to Sundance where it became subject of a bidding war that appropriately was won by A24. Appropriately, I note, because Talk to Me is perhaps one of the first movies to be inspired by the A24 model -or at least Ari Aster’s Hereditary, widely agreed to have been what broke A24 through as a major independent production and distribution company. And yet Talk to Me definitely has enough of its own voice to join such ranks as an equal rather than copycat -it’s smart and original, and technically very proficient for a debut movie.
That said, like several horror movies, it revolves around teenagers and a party game gone wrong. The game in question involves a severed embalmed hand covered in inscriptions believed to have belonged to an Aboriginal medium. In a seance, when someone says “talk to me” to it, a deceased spirit appears before them, and saying “I let you in” allows the spirit to temporarily possess them -usually to creepy or amusing results for the audience gathered. Mia, aggrieved and troubled since the suicide of her mother, and who has latched onto the surrogate family of her friend Jade (Alexandra Jensen), tries this game at a party and soon everyone is doing it. But the spirits aren’t so quick to leave as initially thought.
The root of the horrors in Talk to Me are very much in a space of trauma and dread, as much as it may also lean on shock and violence where appropriate. There is something of an addiction metaphor to the possessions, especially in the way everyone talks about them, but they also stand in for a form of tragic predation. Mia’s grief makes her a more susceptible target for manipulation, her desperation for closure and to make sense of her mother’s death is a particular vulnerability, as is the strength of her attachments. The very kind of things that have been gradually built up to support herself mentally and emotionally are where the demons attack and it’s an incredibly bleak sentiment. A guttural kind of horror that really resonates and smartly allows the protagonist to be a stronger avatar, whose emotions and actions are felt deeply.
But a huge part of this is due to Sophie Wilde’s captivating intensity in this role, one that ought to put her on the Hollywood and indie cinema radars as a thrilling new talent. She commits incredibly not just to the emotional and psychological despair the part requires, but the challenges of physicality it presents as well. In the scenes where Mia is possessed, she is exceptionally haunting in her choices, her line deliveries (the repeated cries of “I will split you” surely send shivers up the spine). She is formidable and empathetic in equal measure, a horror breakout on par with the likes of Florence Pugh in Midsommar or Anya Taylor-Joy in The Witch.
Bird is quite remarkable too where the plot necessitates him to go to darker places, as are several other members of the cast, including Miranda Otto as the charming mother of Riley and Jade. Everyone grasps the at times uncomfortable authenticity of their characters. This is a movie in part about the stupid things kids do, and that is relayed with a palpable concern -even without the creepy spirit hand, the general attitudes of several of these teens is disturbing enough. The Philippous have a great sense of mood, they know how to build tension in creative ways that don’t necessarily rely on usual horror techniques -they can let a character’s simple social anxiety do that, or they can light scenes with no horror elements in a brooding atmosphere that may catch your subconscious off guard. And as for the scares, these are guys way more interested in what is unsettling than what is shocking. The violence in this movie isn’t any more or less gruesome than your average horror film, but the way it is applied sparingly and with a kind of chaotic wantonness makes it more deeply disturbing. They are smart to keep the spirit world almost entirely in shadows -the one glimpse we see of it before the end may or may not be an unreliable vision. Yet the creatures they bring forth from it have a particular grotesqueness of manner apart from their mere appearance -it’s in this that they are in good company with Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, and Mike Flanagan. There isn’t much in the way of jump scares here, but there is a freaky sustained shot of a slimy old woman ghost sucking on the foot of a teenage boy.
Effects like these are another of the Philippou’s strengths. They understand how to create truly creepy imagery in often-seeming practical ways. The make-up on every character who consents to possession is striking: the shrivelled and gaunt features, cracked skin around the orifices, hugely dilated pupils. And these are distinct from what is applied to the spirits like Mia’s mother -each existing in their own weird, wet atmosphere. Arguably the greatest effect of the film is the hand itself, which doesn’t even move much but is so ghastly to look at with its ivory whiteness and runes. There’s a frightful tangibility too, perhaps in its expression that makes it creepier than a generic cast. Stronger visual effects are used, but precisely as punctuations or signatures of a distorted psyche, making them seem more bold. The ending is a perfect encapsulation of such captivating visual instincts: a slow-burn reveal that is pretty easy to spot from a mile off, but so aesthetically audacious and chillingly executed that it is the most singularly powerful sequence of the movie.
It is an ending that, tied neatly to the euthanasia motif, might feel overly grim, especially in light of a number of facts around it and certain themes that the Philippous bring up without much interest in interrogating seriously. If you watch their video attending the Sundance première or any interviews that have circulated lately, they give off an impression of hyper-enthusiastic movie himbos fanboying over the attention folks like Aster, Peele, and Stephen King have given their little film. Yet they are clearly quite talented individuals as the sharply pitched and methodical artistry of Talk to Me bears out. In the end that’s what really matters for this underdog labour-of-love horror flick of impressive craft and intensity. Let it in.
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