This Week, According To Rani...
Obsession, Reviewed - The Villain Wasn't Who We Thought...
Last night Steph and I braved the cinemas to see Obsession. We are both thriller lovers, so the excitement was real - though I'll be honest, I walked in half expecting it to be scary in that cringe, eye-roll kind of way. A movie about a girl obsessed with her boyfriend felt like a hard narrative to nail.
I walked out of that cinema genuinely scared. So scared that I made Steph watch me get into my car and drive away before she left. Just in case.
But here's the thing - the fear wasn't really about the horror. It was about something much more familiar than that.
On the surface, Obsession positions Nikki as the villain. She's the one doing the terrifying things. She's the one the audience is supposed to fear. But if you sit with the film for a moment longer than it asks you to, something shifts. Because the character that stayed with me wasn't Nikki at all. It was a bear.
Bear just wanted to be loved.
There's a moment in the film that I haven't been able to shake. Nikki is asleep - somewhere between this world and whatever has taken hold of her - when she begs for mercy. Bear's response is quiet, almost confused. What's so bad about being with me? And Nikki, speaking from somewhere deep, replies: I've never been with you, Bear.
It isn't even her waking self saying it. It's her soul. And still, the truth of it lands like something final.
And that's where the film stopped being a horror movie for me and started being something else entirely.
Because how many people do that? Love a version of someone that doesn't quite exist. Pour everything into a feeling that was never truly being mirrored back. Bear's obsession isn't born from malice - it's born from that very human, very desperate need to be chosen by someone. And when that need goes unchecked, when love isn't let go of gracefully, it becomes its own kind of possession.
You cannot make someone love you. And the cost of trying - to them, to yourself - is something this film captures in a way that felt genuinely unsettling.
What makes Obsession even more interesting to me is what it represents outside of its own story. This film was made on a budget of $700,000. No household names. No franchise safety net. And it has grossed over $300 million.
In an era of washed-up remakes and sequels nobody asked for, a first-time feature filmmaker - Curry Barker, who built his craft through budget films and YouTube - just had one of the biggest cinematic moments of the year. There's something exciting about that. Something that feels like a reminder that a great idea, told with conviction, will always find its audience.
I can't wait to see what he does next.