Talk to Me

Talk to Me is a movie of miracles. One of them is the fact that the brothers directing have managed to put together such a mature and high-quality film as their debut, from the superbly chosen sound design, camera angles to the well-cast who, after a long time in such a consumer horror film, manage to captivate and you will remember them even weeks later. Another very pleasing piece of news is that this Australian festival flick has made it to our cinemas and we won't be waiting a year for its release. And the third one is a kind of difference in execution, which makes from a mere exorcism makes very different film, one with its own signature that is simply "something different". And even if it is hard to say what it is in particular, you can feel from the first minutes that this is not a generic thing like The Conjuring or Annabelle. The most important thing that makes this film its own and different is the choice to go a little way into the art and the willingness to combine quality filmmaking with a suffocating atmosphere, the original idea of the mummified hand and, most importantly, the intensity of the summoning scenes, which had me glued to my seat watching what was going to happen. The violence, blood and raw brutality of some of the scenes is downright iconic, and when it comes to them, horror fans will be sniffling in bliss. Of course, this brings me to the only complaint I have for this film, and that is that there is too much plot filler and that if they had added a couple more summoning scenes and get more of what we all came here for, which is the pure evil of the demon during the summoning sessions, I would be fully satisfied. As it is, I feel mostly satisfied, but deep down also a little impoverished, as those séances were very sparse. (08/05/2023)

Talk to Me is an enjoyable little ghost story from the antipodes that doesn't try to get an audience response with cheap scares, but instead spends a good amount of time on the relationships between the main characters. The concept of ghost séances as risky fun for careless zoomers is an interesting premise that could sound utterly ridiculous in the wrong hands, but here it works very solidly, thanks mainly to the believable and not annoying characters of Australian teenagers. (01/26/2023)

A hand extended from the beyond is unlikely to be helpful, or rather, "this spirit is a cunt." Grief that hurts so much and affects judgment to the point of consuming a person. The mobile phone camera acts as an emotional barrier to the events it captures. Recreational drug use that can, with a snap of the fingers, escalate quickly. The twins who revere Friedkin’s The Exorcist focus more on characters and appropriate realism rather than on blatantly shocking scenes, and when shocks do occur, they use practical effects. If predicting the plot’s further development is difficult, and it’s not entirely foolish, we can speak of rare originality in this genre. (10/02/2023)

The much-praised Australian horror film Talk to Me was supposed to be my dark horse this year. I was looking forward to it since the first trailer, and the rave reviews from abroad only increased my hype, plus the proven studio A24. But in the end I'm slightly disappointed. For a debut, Talk to Me is definitely very mature and noteworthy, but I didn't feel the right spark. So first I'll sum up the pros. The biggest asset is the original idea, we follow a ghostly séance of young Australian teenagers using a mummified hand, where they get possessed by a random ghost for 90 seconds. The appearance of the ghosts is creepy and these séances are fun until things go wrong, of course. (The twist is pleasantly brutal!). But just when the viewer thinks the film is finally going to get going, sadly the best part is over. The characters, who can act and who aren't downright annoying, are interesting. The make up effects are good, the film is technically up to par, and it's very nice to see that it’s is not a PG-13 but an R-rated ghost story, though it can't be said that the viewer gets proper gore. Not many characters die, and the more brutal scenes are three at most, so the potential to unleash more savagery was definitely there. There are few jump-scares, and the atmosphere isn't too scary either, it's more of a psychological drama most of the time, where we do see ghosts, but they don't make any mess of the characters or the viewer. Most of all, I was let down by the weak finale, which can't be called a finale, because the film doesn't go anywhere. It's worth a strong 3 stars because some elements were fine and there's a sense of a different approach, but the slower pace, few scary attractions and weaker finale don't let me go for 4. I’ll have to wait for Saw X, The Exorcist Believer and The Last Voyage of the Demeter. 6/10. (08/07/2023)

Talk to the hand, or combine an idiotic viral TikTok challenge, a metaphor for drugs, a drama about mourning and a horror movie about possession and you have the genre flick of year, in which cleverly malicious directing, excellent actors and a heavy atmosphere in which the world of phantoms that may or may not mean well by people increasingly crosses over into reality. A more than respectable successor to films such as Get Out and It Follows. I’m trembling! (12/05/2023)