Shudder Saturday: Influencers (2025)

I really enjoyed Influencer. I didn't think it needed a sequel though. I wasn't even sure it would be possible to create another story for any of the main characters. Writer-director Kurtis David Harder was sure though, and the end result here shows that he was right to be sure.

The whole thing starts with a woman at the end of her rope. She has a knife. She uses it. Her phone starts ringing. It's then time to reunite with the entertaining psycho known as CW (Cassandra Naud), who is now happy in a relationship with a woman named Diane (Lisa Delamar). It would seem to be only a matter of time until her history rears up to bite her on the ass though, especially when Madison (Emily Tennant) becomes more determined to track her down and make her pay for everything that transpired in the first movie.

I don't want to make the mistake of over-hyping this, to anyone else or myself, but Influencers is pretty damn great. It's not only another enjoyable bit of time spent with leads who were so good last time, but it's a genuinely fantastic sequel. Is the premise plausible? Not really. Harder gives us enough details to make it seem so though, even if we only need to suspend our disbelief for a short time until all of the main players start being moved around and manipulated on the way to a very satisfying and thrilling third act.

I wish I'd been able to make time for a repeat viewing of the first movie before moving on to this, I suspect the two together makes for a hell of a good evening of entertainment, but you do get a bit of a recap once Madison comes back into the narrative. You just have to be patient during a lengthy opening sequence that ends up proving vital in setting up plot points and details that will recur later on like breadcrumbs along a path leading to a very dark and very dangerous copse in the very middle of a forest.

Naud remains a compelling presence, helped by a script that allows her to dance from playful to deadly within any scene. Tennant is equal to her, and it's interesting to see her character being picked apart and ruined by the same people who used to idolise and envy her. Delamar is an interesting addition, and her role casts a surprisingly long shadow over the proceedings, and there are turns from Veronica Long, Georgina Campbell, and Jon Whitesell that are, by turns, hilarious and awful.

Considering how unlikely this instalment was, it's testament to Harder's guiding hand that I now want a trilogy, at the very least. I'd settle for either Deinfluencer, Under The Influence, or INFLUENC3. Mr. Harder, take it away. There's a lot of gold to still be mined here, considering the huge supply of potential victims all easily made vulnerable by someone preying on their vanity, and the whole thing could end up being the most satisfying killer thrillers of the social media age. Hashtags and bodybags go very well together.

8/10

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Shudder Saturday: Influencer (2022)

AKA The Talented Miss Selfie. Or maybe that's just my pet name for this.

Everyone seems to be focused on how they present themselves online now. Not just themselves, but also their lifestyle, their surroundings, and, of course, their food. I resisted the lure of Instagram for a long time, only caving in when I decided to use it as a daily way to promote the podcast I co-host. Have I photographed a gorgeous meal? Yes. I tend to use it most to share movie images though, whether I am selecting posters or specific movie moments, and I also enjoy showcasing recent additions to my movie collection (without ever sharing a picture of the dents in my credit card balance).

Influencer, as the title suggests, shows us some people who take their time on Instagram much more seriously than I do. It's no surprise to see that director and co-writer Kurtis David Harder was also a producer on the excellent Superhost (a film that this pairs very nicely with), and the script crafted by Harder and Tesh Guttikonda, unashamedly also runs close to the many "*insert noun* from hell" movies that really started to form a solid sub-genre in the late 1980s, after the success of Fatal Attraction.

The excellent Cassandra Naud is a woman known simply as CW. She sees a pretty influencer in a bar (Madison, played by Emily Tennant) and conspires to get close to her, claiming that she could easily take over Madison's social media account and nobody would notice the difference. CW is talented with tech, able to manipulate photos and video footage to make it seem as if someone is still just living their best life, even if they're temporarily incapacitated by a psychopath (hypothetically). CW then meets another influencer (Jessica, played by Sara Canning) and starts to use her same old tricks, but this time her plan is upset by the appearance of Madison's boyfriend, Ryan (Rory J. Saper). 

While Harder and Guttikonda do well with this premise, mixing entertaining tension and obvious commentary in a way that somehow never feels too unbelievable, they have helped themselves enormously in two main ways. First of all, despite the opening credits coming in at just over the 20-minute mark, this has an appropriate runtime of approximately 90 minutes. Second, the cast are all a perfect fit for their roles. Naud is the highlight, but everyone does great work.

As she moves between charm and threat, Naud is constantly enthralling, and figuring out how she might stop things unravelling is just as much fun as watching her pull from the bag of tricks that she uses to hook in potential victims. We get to see most of the other characters trying to figure things out and maintain what they assume is a standard level of civility, but Naud gets to play the person who we see acting most often with "no filter" (and it surely cannot be coincidence that she is known as CW, which is shorthand online for Content Warning). Both Tennant and Canning are believable Insta-people, with the latter having the advantage of being able to witness things that make her more suspicious and defensive than the former. Saper's character is a bit irritating, deliberately so, but his tenacity helps to set up a finale that viewers will look forward to, knowing that there has to be some confrontation with CW that should end in one of two ways.

The more I think about this, the less I find to criticise. Of course it all starts to fall apart if you start to dig deeper into each main component of CW's plan, but it keeps everything entertaining and interesting enough that you don't stop to analyse it all while it's playing out. And, let's whisper it to avoid funny looks, there are also one or two moments here that a number of us may view as wish-fulfilment.

8/10

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Open 24 Hours (2018)

Vanessa Grasse plays Mary, a young woman with a whole mass of mental health issues, thanks to the fact that she eventually set fire to her serial killer boyfriend. Freshly released from prison, and keen to start making her life more normal, Mary gets a job working at a gas station, on the night shift. After being shown the ropes by Bobby (Brendan Fletcher), it is time for Mary to be alone. Just her and the customers. And the visions of her killer boyfriend doing more killing. But are the visions just in her head, or is he out for revenge. 

Written and directed by Padraig Reynolds, who also gave us the fine little horror Worry Dolls, as well as some other enjoyable genre treats, Open 24 Hours has a lot that it does well, even if there are many moments that we have seen done numerous times before. 

The first thing it does well is the way it shades the central character. Mary is a victim, and traumatised by what she went through, but there's also something more complicated to her relationship with her ex-boyfriend. She was referred to as "the watcher" by many, and Reynolds manages to maintain some ambiguity there as viewers get to consider how much Mary witnessed, and how much she may have found even slightly thrilling. It's a theme that runs through most of the movie, and elevates this above many similar slasher flicks.

The next thing it does well is casting. Grasse is just right in the lead role, showing her nervousness while not overdoing things. She doesn't have a huge filmography yet, but I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for her in any future movie projects. Fletcher is someone I always enjoy seeing onscreen, and does well in his supporting role, a friendly face who also gets some background information out of the main character, helping to get viewers more fully informed. Cole Vigue is suitably menacing as the real/imagined killer, and Daniel O'Meara is both tough and caring as Tom Doogan, the parole officer who wants Mary to at least have a chance to do better.

Reynolds does a great job with the script, throwing in some scares here and there throughout a first half that is all about character development before increasing the tension and potential for bloodshed in the second half. He's equally adept when it comes to the direction, maintaining a nice balance between the gore gags and the complex character at the heart of the story. A couple of moments threaten to make things a bit too far-fetched, but you can say that about most slasher movies. This remains more grounded than most.

There are flaws, and it's hard to say whether many people will enjoy this as much as I did, or whether they will prefer one half over the other, but Open 24 Hours is a film you should definitely give some time to. It does what Reynolds wants it to do, and it does it very well.

7/10

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