Five teenagers find themselves stuck on a video call with an avatar using the account of a dead girl. One by one, they are forced to reveal their secrets or die, seemingly by their own hand.
This was better than I thought it would be. I had never seen a "screen life" movie, where everything plays out like it's showing on a computer, but it's increasingly popular. Makes sense. It has limited application but it worked here with such a self-contained story. Especially because everyone who used Skype ten years ago is very familiar with the freezes, trails, and pixilation you got with a bad connection. I never would have thought to mine that for horror, but good job. It also helps that all the kids in this are unlikeable. You believe that they would have dogpiled a girl to death so their comeuppance feels righteous.
Bullying is bad, kids! Just because you can make an anonymous account and say awful shit to a person doesn't mean you can't be found and punched in the mouth and/or harassed by an invisible entity of revenge.
Unfriended is streaming on Criterion but only until the end of November, so hop on it.
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