Backrooms - Honest Public Reviews

Backrooms is a movie based on the web series and the creepypasta. The film follows Clark, who is dealing with some problems with his marriage and his career. He also visits a therapist named Mary, who also deals with her own trauma. Clark discovers the Backrooms and starts exploring. In the second half of the movie, we see the real meaning of the Backrooms, along with a plot twist to Clark's character. However, I thought this was quite rushed, and they could've expanded more on what the Backrooms really meant instead of just expecting the audience to figure it out since the vibes of the first and second halves of the movie were really different. These include the Async company, which was barely shown, and the "entities" in the Backrooms. The metaphor of the Backrooms was pretty interesting though. It did make sense and was overall a great idea for the characters they made here. The ending may be a bit confusing, though, but if you really think about it, it does make sense for what Mary experienced in the Backrooms, even if it isn't clear what really happened to her or Async afterwards.

The set designs were really good, though, as they were built like mazes that really set the tone of the movie. The lighting also created an eerie vibe of this other dimension that the characters go into. However, I was disappointed since I wanted to see more rooms and spend more time in them. We only saw rooms for a minute or less, and then we moved on.

Backrooms is a surprising horror film that has a great atmosphere, an eerie vibe, and a very interesting premise and metaphor. However, it lacks some exposition and character development to truly make it a modern classic.

Backrooms is a fascinating horror-film about the self-defeating cycles we all occasionally find ourselves trapped within. It's about the liminal spaces which exist in our minds, where we sometimes get lost.

Backrooms is also about a literal maze of hallways which opens up and swallows people, and about the monsters found there.

It's both an artful metaphor, and a creature-feature - and it balances both those things perfectly. That's not as easy as this film makes it seem. I had some quibbles with certain plot-developments - but overall, I really enjoyed this film. Due to its compelling ambiguity and its keen visual style, I suspect it will be highly re-watchable.

This is an impressive debut from director Kane Parsons, who based the film largely on his own series of popular YouTube shorts, which he distributed under the name Kane Pixels. Those shorts were, in turn, based on a creepypasta which traces its origin back to 2019 (but feels like it's been around much longer). So Parsons wasn't exactly the person who "invented" the idea of the Backrooms, but his shorts were among the most viral Backrooms content. That's why A24 gave him a movie-deal, or so the story goes.

Anyway, Parsons is one of the talking-points here, because he's the latest (and perhaps the most widely-known) YouTuber to get his own movie. It's become a bit of a trend, following Mark "Markiplier" Fischbach's Iron Lung, Curry Barker's Obsession, and others. Parsons is young - only 20! - and so, there's an observation to be made about the way that technology has enabled a new, young generation of filmmakers to bypass traditional gatekeepers.

But that talking-point wouldn't be so interesting if these films weren't good - and I mean, I can't speak for Iron Lung or Obsession because I haven't seen them yet. Word is that they're certainly not bad. But Backrooms? Well, this film was far better than I had dared to expect. Color me impressed.

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Let me back-up for a moment, though, into my own personal backrooms. See, I must confess that I have a soft-spot for the basic ideas this film is based around.

Sometime in the 1990s, I recall telling my brother about my personal vision of Hell. It wouldn't be some fire-and-brimstone place, I said - but a never-ending network of interlinked rooms and corridors, which you would wander, forever alone. There would be evidence of other people, and sometimes you might hear others talking behind the walls - but they could never hear you and you'd never be able to find them.

Such thoughts must have been in the zeitgeist, because in March of 2000, author Mark Z. Danielewski published a postmodern horror-novel called House of Leaves, which effectively imagines a very similar scenario: A family discovers a new door inside their house, which leads into an endless, ever-shifting labyrinth of rooms below. They explore at their own peril, and get lost in their own private mazes.

That novel made a huge impression on me, as it did on many. For many years, people online buzzed about what a great film it might make.

So, I come to Backrooms as a longtime fan of House of Leaves. And to fans of that book, I am saying: Backrooms isn't exactly "The Navidson Record" - but the DNA of that story can be strongly felt here. In many ways, Backrooms is the film I was hoping "The Navidson Record" might be.

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Backrooms primarily revolves around Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and Mary (Renate Reinsve). He's a furniture-salesman in midlife-crisis mode, who was recently kicked out of his house by a wife who didn't appreciate his drinking or his course manner. Mary's his shrink, but she has secret crises of her own - which are detailed in dreamlike sequences by the film. Clark discovers a mysterious portal in the basement of his store, which enters a space he doesn't understand, and he tells Mary about it. Their characters are well-defined, and both Ejiofor and Reinsve bring depth to these people without overselling the emotional beats.

The script helps, frequently providing Clark and Mary with interesting things to say. Even when they're just trying to describe the strange space they've discovered out loud, the metaphors they grapple with are interesting, and contain a kind of matter-of-fact poetry.

But where this film really shines is in the cinematography, and the sound-design. Those elements work together here, with maximum intent, to help tell this story.

I'm a sucker for a film that's shot with a strong eye. Backrooms finds a way to put its story into the visuals - while also keeping the visuals dreamlike, surreal, uncanny, and liminal. The film mixes visual-styles, largely telling the story of Clark and Mary in a crisp, modern, cinematic style - but switching to grainy handheld video on occasions when a character is using a videocamera. This allows the film to benefit from the artful restraint of classical cinematography, while also leaning-into the visceral nature of the "found-footage" style when appropriate. The film makes great use of both styles - but I was particularly impressed in how Parsons and his crew evoked liminality and the film's various themes through the classical camerawork on display here. Make no mistake: There are some beautiful images here - and beautifully-unsettling ones as well.

Ultimately, the film fell a little short for me in its final half, due to the actions of a certain character, and certain moments which followed from that. It's one of those things where - well, I didn't exactly feel like this character wouldn't do that - but I had just sort of hoped for a finale that avoided the darkest possible outcome for this person.

But you know, sometimes our inner demons get the better of us - and I guess that's what the idea is here, especially given the exact shape of the monster which reveals itself... And that's as far as I can go, without giving away major spoilers.

Ultimately, I found Backrooms to be a very satisfying film, which truly surpassed my expectations. If I had certain problems with the final half, they weren't dealbreakers. I have a feeling these rooms will be interesting to revisit - yellow wallpaper and all.

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Find more of my reviews under the name Mazus Graves at:

www . Outlandobserver . Com.

The film is creepy + creative. It's successful because of how it makes YOU feel - very unsettled!

What I liked-

The visual and set designs were awesome. The whole movie feels creepy and immersive. The creative atmosphere is the movie's biggest strength

What I didn't-

Although it's a film more about the aura than story.. the story never fully comes together. A lot of build + not a lot of payoff..

If you're a contemporary horror fan, you'll enjoy the atmosphere and creativity enough. Just don't expect to leave the theater 100% satisfied!

6/10.

Maybe I am too old, but being 33 I watched cartoons as a kid that were more scary and disturbing than this. I feel you either need to be younger gen Z to like this or pretentious enough to pretend to like it in order to give a high rating. Absolute waste of time. The whole backrooms allegory was poorly executed and poorly understood by the screenwriters and the director apparently.

I am not the best person to leave a review here since the last movies i saw in theaters was cars 2 when it came out and fast and furious 6. Still, i enjoyed the movie. The ambience of it is lovely and very well done, sadly, the only intense moments are when there is suspense or all of the sudden action that catches you by surprise, the rest felt pretty boring, deep but boring at the same time (somehow). I love the fact that they didnt add any of the new "slop" made by new fans that didnt know what the backrooms ACTUALLY are (tiktok users etc). I am sure that when the movie ended, everyone in the theater thought at the same time "thats it?". They could have made at least half an hour more of movie, with a more concrete ending.

Just saw it in theaters, one day before global release. The visuals and scenery is amazing. The actors are fine but the lore is awfully vague. Nothing is given to the audience and they have to piece together tiny crumbs of information just to understand the film. The liminality is insane. The spaces stuck a cord with me and that's why I end up liking the movie despite the lack of a coherent story or ending. It gets a six.

This isn't a throw-BACK...this is the Next Generation of Horror.

I was about to begin my review - BEFORE I saw this film - with: This took a Backroom to Obsession. And yet, I'm now more Obsessed with Backrooms. Sorry, Obsession...take a back seat to 2nd place.

What a time we live in. Maybe it's whenever we have a MONSTER in the White House, we get such great Horror movies. People are truly drawn to Horror when things aren't great in the world and this year...MONTH...has truly matched up. Two freaking homeruns in a row (Obsession and Backrooms.)

Despite this being an online thing or game, either of which I was completely oblivious to, this has to be one of thee most original horror, ah-hem, any movie, of all-time. I marveled so hard throughout this entire movie with how vastly different it was and yet so grounded.

Also, this SHOULD ABSOLUTELY win Best Production Design. By a landslide. May 30, 2026, I'm calling it for the remainder of the year.

A truly layered, down-on-his-"luck" furniture store manager/owner(?) gets thrust into an outer-worldly "backrooms" maze of extraordinary depth. What? How? Why? You decide.

This is the movie I had wished Longlegs would've been. In fact, the lead female reminded me so much of the Longlegs' lead female. They just did it better here.

I haven't had this much emotion leaving a theatre in such a long time. I cannot process how much I loved this and where it concluded. While I truly love so many horror films of the past decade, including Hereditary, The Substance and, again, Obsession, I love how many more original, deep, disturbing, fun, thought-provoking, jaw-dropping art pieces keep making to the big screen.

This movie made me so happy to be alive. And that's because it's so rich in creativity and people who seek to make us scared and appreciate life. This is real art. Real filmmaking. Sure, spend $300 million on a Disney movie and they simply fail at making a treasure with 1/100th the budget.

Bravo. This may not win any top awards from Hollywood. It will from true fans.

***

Final Thoughts: I can only guess this was set in 1990 to avoid the whole "cell-phone" horror trap/trope. I can, for certain, say: this was 100% 1990. And not in a Stranger Things homage to the 80s. Every set, every couch, seat, lamp, design....1990. Again, Oscars...honor this.

My main issue with the Backrooms movie is Kane Parsons attempt to make the movie into too many different things. There are many themes, and not enough time to go through every one which leaves the viewer asking for more. It's honestly fairly deep and I enjoyed watching it, it just felt like many aspects were not developed enough so the movie seemed to go every direction.

Backrooms at first seemed like it had an intriguing it hook, then it just seemed like it wasn't going to do anything interesting with it and then by the end it just seemed to do nothing with it whatsoever. I've never seen the YouTube shorts and was going in purely based on the positive buzz and the solid trailers but in the end it was completely hamstrung by a script that gives off major first draft vibes and an edit that feels like one of the least effect versions of itself.

It's a shame because film started on a very strong note for me. I appreciated the patience in how it was paced and directed and it really seemed like the film was taking its time to set up a really compelling mystery with genuinely creepy imagery. It's phenomenal in how it uses big empty spaces to its advantage and I really liked discovering more of this realm as the characters did, But at a certain point I realised what my issue with the movie was; it just doesn't really have a second act. The film ends up feeling really choppy in how it's put together and it really feels like a lot of key scenes were removed that built up the story and the characters. The first half is constantly up building up a mystery only for the second to completely change gears into something that didn't feel nearly alluded to enough.

After a very awkwardly insert found footage sequence there's a key change in one of the characters that didn't feel earned at all and it just changes the movie from something that at least felt unique into something that felt a lot more standard horror fare. The film very much ends up feeling like a three-hander and I was curious to see how they would all tie together but to say it was disappointing would be an understatement. They devote so much time to Renate Reinsve's backstory only for it to never amount to anything meaningful and there's another plot line at play that I was by far the most interested in but completely fell flat in one of the most bafflingly abrupt endings I've seen in a long time. In the end the movie just feels like a few films in one and as a result nothing the script is really trying to accomplish gets the time it needs to be executed in any kind of satisfying way.

I really wanted to like this movie more than I did and I gave it the benefit of the doubt for as long as I could but at a certain point it just lost my faith in it. It's genuinely creepy and it's got certain images that I don't think will ever leave me but the script just was not there for me at all and it contains some truly puzzling writing decisions. I feel like there has to be a longer version of this movie available somewhere because it really does feel like key moments are just simply missing and really negatively impacts the whole experience. Either that or this concept as a whole just works better in an anthology format. I appreciate the story behind the film but ultimately I just did not think it translated to any kind of a satisfying narrative.

Torturously slow! This movie moved so slow but the final act made the long wait for the payoff an even bigger disappointment. I would have rather spent 2 hours with my ex-wife.

Torturously slow! This movie moved so slow but the final act made the long wait for the payoff an even bigger disappointment. I would have rather spent 2 hours with my ex-wife.

The decorations, level design are outstanding - visually pleasing and disturbing at the same time.

Meanwhile the plot and the character's arc doesn't make much sense. It is basically a collection of rubbish scenes tied together in a strange, grotesque space.

The Vibe is cool though. The issue is that the viewer has to crawl through a very boring metaphor to enjoy it.

I wanted to love this cause frankly, I'm inspired by Kane Parsons and the whole process behind this movie. That being said, it was somewhat of a letdown. It starts very slowly, almost painfully slow. It takes pace with what I'd say is the highlight of this movie, which is the found footage bit. After that it again slows down a bit with it's final act. The main thing that bothers me are the characters, which are very shallow and slow down the plot a bit. Overall, a really cool debut, and I'm really excited to see what Kane Parsons will make in the future.

P. S. Never in my life I would've expected a marathi ad in an A24 movie.

Kane if ur seeing this love from south africa.

Lowkey cinemas here are dead and ive never seen the cinema so full!

WE NEED PART 2!!!!!#11111.

I made an account just for this and I must say this was absolutely eye candy and an absolute worth my rent money!!

Kids hate me but this comes first, il never regret leaving them to see this.

If you are an aspiring dead beat, then this is your sign to drop them and go watch this movie. Thank you.

It's hard to call the visual style revolutionary or ground-breaking, because it is so faithful to the backrooms imagery we have seen across the internet for a few years now. But that is no criticism; the way this film faithfully captures the unsettling pseudo-familiarity of the backrooms internet mythos is fantastic. Alongside that gorgeous visual style is a strong (though fairly straightforward) performance from our leads, and a fitting eerie soundscape.

Beyond that the film is a little harder to compliment. Not that the writing is particularly egregious or objectionable, but it just feels like a tertiary consideration of the film. The paper thin plot could be compelling with great dialogue to pad it out, or the paper thin dialogue could be forgiven with a compelling plot. But together it just leaves the audience feeling a little empty. The intention of the writing is clear, the backrooms are banal, yet mysterious, unknowable yet familiar, infinite yet sparse, cluttered but empty, and the dialogue and writing seems to try to mirror that feeling. Leaving as much to our imagination as possible without provoking our imagination too much. It's an admirable thing to attempt to match writing to theme and tone so closely, but unfortunately when the theme and tone is a deep sense of discomfiting emptiness you're more likely to write a disappointment than a compelling film.

All this isn't to say it's a bad film. It really isn't. And if you're curious about checking it out because you like the ideas behind it, you should probably watch it. It might not be rewatch material but that isn't a failure. It's not a great movie, but it is still a good one. And for an indie flick based on an internet meme, that's gotta count as an absolute win.

This movie perfectly captures the unsettling vibe of Backrooms, not just Backrooms but also weirdcore, dreamcore, etc. This film is truly terrifying and very good, I highly recommend it. The sets are very well done, the CGI is also very good, the acting is phenomenal, everything is very good, it was worth the wait, absolute cinema.

10/10 for sure.

Amazing, anyone saying otherwise just hate the way kane pardon envisioned the premise or concept of the backrooms. The movie isn't generic, it does a great job combining and utilitasing the original ideas of the backrooms we have had from the original story. Hopefully kane will have more opportunities to make more great movies.

Nice movie but it doesn't feel complete. Ending felt vague enough to make a sequel or two. The cinematography is good and it has good acting. I don't know what I was expecting but I left feeling incomplete. I'm hopeful for the next movie they release. I know I repeated myself a few times but the movie doesn't really leave me much to talk about.

It was slow and mostly tedious to watch, without a plot you could follow and then ended without logic. Getting sick of these crap movies that suddenly end with a blank screen. It isn't horror unless for a 5-year-old scared of the dark. This maybe exciting for those who played the computer game, but they most likely have limited vision of reality anyway.

"Backrooms" is Kane Parsons' feature film debut and extension of his YouTube series, where the shady tech company Async monitors, documents and researches the titular Backrooms, an extra-dimensional space that defies logic and reason.

The movie, set in June of 1990, is an incredible and wonderfully original work. Feeling like a surreal blend of David Lynch and Mike Flanagan, with heavy emphasis on dream-like atmosphere, the movie both expands upon and even answers some questions from the series while asking new questions. The acting is phenomenal, especially Ejiofor and Reinsve, and the visuals are some of the best A24 has ever produced, due in no small part to Parsons' vision and Jeremy Cox's cinematography.

My only issue with the movie is the speculation about what the Backrooms are, because it does contradict the very first short film from Kane to some degree, but besides that nitpick, this is a phenomenal feature debut.

Solid film, truly. BUT... could have and should have been better. I left the theater a bit confused on how I felt lol. It's almost as if they didn't no how to end it? Cause at the end it surely falls flat man. The beginning feels solid and even the climax picks up well but then after that, something happens. It just falls out and gets almost boring.