Horrorfest 2022 Presents: Watcher (2022, Chloe Okuno)

Although Watcher is a slow burn, the movie pays off pretty well in the last half and it is a very claustrophobic and intense horror thriller that lets the viewer into the mindset of a woman in a foreign city. Lucky for her she is with her boyfriend, however she is left alone to her own devices while he is working and she wanders Bucharest, all while a serial killer runs amok. Maika Monroe is excellent in role of Julia, who attracts unwanted attention when she looks across at another building’s window from hers. Sure this is very Rear Window to a degree, yet Watcher operates differently from that one. Chloe Okuno does a fine job of showing the viewer what possibly justifiable paranoia feels like, and how women often experience this whenever they go. It’s quite different for a man, and I often think about how I’m fine walking alone in many places, where as women wouldn’t feel this way. That’s too bad, yet that’s often the case.

I’m a little mixed about the finale, and I kind of wondered if maybe things could have played out a bit differently. Maybe the movie couldn’t have had it’s cake and eaten it too, yet that final shot is rather haunting and very effective. I probably should have tried to see this movie in theaters, and I loved those late night scenes that linger in my mind a little. Cities look so beautiful and peaceful at night, yet behind closed doors may lurk unknown horrors or evil that we don’t know about. Horror movies do a great job of bringing that to the forefront, although some times it can make one very fearful and well, paranoid. Shudder has this one, check it out.