In the decade since “elevated horror” became a critical buzzword, the genre’s been inundated with self-serious experiences that sacrifice zany, garish thrills for artistic resonance. Director Curry Barker—best known for “that’s a bad idea,” a YouTube comedy sketch series—obliterates that line with his gory, ghastly studio debut, Obsession. Armed with an absurdly simple setup that weaponizes our collective familiarity with monkey’s paw curses and unrequited crushes, Barker’s film hypnotically teeters between being viscerally nerve-wracking and darkly hilarious.

As its relentless gauntlet of grotesqueries comes into focus, Obsession routinely dares us to perversely smile through terrors we should probably be wincing through. As pure comedic delight bleeds into unfathomable fear, Barker cements one of the most unhinged and invigorating horror experiences in recent memory—one that renders relatable insecurities into waking, unbearable nightmares.

Barker’s film centres on Bear (Michael Johnston), a young, insecure man who has long crushed over his childhood friend Nikki (Inde Navarrette). Afraid that another attempt to profess his love will sputter and die, he purchases a gag gift to hopefully ease the tension. The so-called “One Wish Willow” promises to grant its buyer one wish when broken in half.

After sullenly wishing for her undivided romantic reciprocating, Nikki immediately morphs into an abominably adoring and viciously clingy girlfriend, who relinquishes every bodily, spiritual need in a feverish bid to be with him forever— even if it means brutally slaughtering anyone who she perceives as a threat to their unholy union. From here, Bear’s dream romance curdles and decomposes into an uncanny nightmare.

Barker’s screenplay wisely doesn’t attempt to track or define the inner mechanics of this twisted, wish-granting spell. Instead, it shrouds it in mystery, using its inscrutable, enigmatic makeup as a source for new, eldritch horrors. In letting our imagination fill in the blanks—especially in what can only be described as a garbled phone call from hell—Obsession feeds off our anxieties while luring us into focusing on every seemingly insignificant detail.

It’s a quality that filters into the film’s sharp, atmospheric visual calculus. As it uncomfortably lingers on every cringe-inducing frame, Barker extracts a palpable sense of pathos, catharsis, and tension from negative space, transforming moments of absence or inaction into its own kind of gestating presence. Much of the film’s spell lies in what doesn’t happen, or what it refuses to show, only for what it eventually reveals to be more guttural and visceral than what we imagined.

Underpinning the effect is careful, economic character work. Bear is not a blameless victim but instead someone who quickly enjoys the social currency and convenient sex the curse offers him. Johnston’s layered performance seamlessly entwines pure despondence with juvenile, toxic masculinity that deepens the film’s already terrifying abyss.

Though it’s Navarrette’s over-the-top performance that steadies the film’s wild tonal shifts. Operating at a crossroads between sheer absurdity and grounded believability, Nikki’s possessed form remains human despite its deranged instability. It’s a star-making turn that’s key to the film’s guttural, deeply disturbing formula.  

For as nightmarish as Obsession becomes, it’s a paranormal experience that remains deeply human at its core, routinely reflecting our worst tendencies back at us. The “One Wish Willow” may be supernatural in origin, but it’s humanity’s gravest sins that give it its true power.

Obsession releases May 15th.