Obsession 2025 - Honest Public Reviews

I'm usually a huge fan of what Blumhouse puts out, so when I saw their name on this I had to see the movie.

Bear's decisions throughout the movie are terrible at every turn, and 99% of the movie could have been prevented had he been given any sign of intelligence by the writers.

The whole movie can be summed as a loop of 'Nikki does thing' -> 'Bear makes a bad decision', a note which I heard the people behind me in the theater mention as they were walking out calling it a 6.5 or 7 out of 10.

The only real scare factor in the whole movie though was 'quiet scene then very loud sound effect', when well used I don't mind this as much but in one particular scene (I'm sure anyone who watched could point out) the sound effect is ridiculously loud compared to what came before, and the entirety of my group watching, as well as several of the groups around us, physically recoiled at the volume, with there additionally being generally bad sound mixing throughout the movie.

I didn't find myself creeped out more than once, and most of their attempts to do so just came off as the funny kind of bad. I couldn't tell whether I was supposed to be scared or laughing in some of the scenes, which I love comedy horrors but they didn't really commit? Awkward can be funny, but it feels like they halfheartedly parody a scene, before then seriously doing a scene in a similar fashion later. It's a bit odd.

For a (psychologically especially) horror movie to be scary, there needs to be some form of realism, and with Bear's unbelievably horrible decisions, the odd acting and sound mixing, there just was no illusion in the first place.

I'll give the movie props for being a great topic of discussion, the 5 people I watched with sat and had a debate over the parts of the movie we did and did not like, and the movie provides enough notable moments to make it a fun discussion piece between people who have seen it.

The parts of the movie I did like for their intended purpose were really good, but I feel the rest of it drags it down to somewhere around a high 6 for me, maybe a 6.5 if I had decimals, definitely worth a watch, but most people I know enjoyed it more ironically than as a horror movie. Laughing at the movie's predictability and generally unrealistic decision-making seems to be the popular way to enjoy at least in my area.

A decent horror film with a fantastic start. It genuinely horrified me and kinda sad too. However, the later acts lose that vibe for me. That is where it becomes somewhat predictable. Even so, the scare factor is solid! I really want to see the uncut version to see what was removed and why? It might potentially up my score for the film. The music was fantastic! It was very eerie and disturbing!

Decent!

Obsession takes a premise that could have been a quirky supernatural romance and twists it into one of the most unsettling horror films of the year. Though to much overhyped on Social Media.

At first glance, it seems simple.

A lonely man desperately wants the woman he loves to love him back.

Then he gets his wish.

But beneath the supernatural setup lies a disturbing question:

What if the person you loved stopped being a person and became exactly what you wanted?

The result is a horror film about obsession, entitlement, loneliness, and the terrifying consequences of trying to control another human being.

It's creepy, emotionally devastating, and surprisingly thoughtful.

And it lingers long after the credits roll.

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✅ What Worked

1. A Brilliant Horror Premise:

The film takes a universal fantasy and forces viewers to confront the darker implications behind it.

Most stories ask what happens when your dreams come true.

Obsession asks whether some dreams should never come true at all.

The concept is simple but incredibly effective.

2. Michael Johnston's Performance:

Bear is not a likable character.

In fact, much of the film depends on the audience recognizing his flaws.

Michael Johnston walks a difficult line between sympathetic loneliness and increasingly disturbing obsession. Especially towards the middle you starting to hate him.

His decisions are no longer to defend.

3. Constant Dread:

Many horror films rely on jump scares.

Obsession relies on discomfort.

The movie creates an atmosphere where every interaction feels wrong.

The more Nikki loves Bear, the more terrifying the situation becomes.

That inversion of a romantic fantasy is where the film finds its strongest horror.

4. Themes That Actually Mean Something:

At its core, the film is about the difference between love and possession.

Bear believes he wants Nikki.

What he really wants is control.

The movie repeatedly asks whether love still counts as love when choice is removed.

Those themes give the horror genuine emotional weight.

5. Memorable Visuals and Atmosphere:

The film has an eerie, dreamlike quality that sticks in your mind.

Several sequences are genuinely disturbing not because of graphic violence but because of how unnatural and wrong everything feels.

The atmosphere does much of the heavy lifting.

❌ What Fell Short

1. Supporting Characters Needed More Development:

Bear and Nikki receive most of the attention, leaving some secondary characters feeling underexplored.

A little more time with the supporting cast would have strengthened the emotional impact.

2. The Mythology Remains Vague:

The mystery surrounding the One Wish Willow is intriguing, but some viewers may want more concrete answers.

The film favors ambiguity over explanation.

Whether that's a strength or weakness will depend on the viewer.

3. A Few Plot Elements Feel Underexplored:

The story introduces several fascinating ideas that never receive full exploration.

It may leave wanting deeper answers about the supernatural forces at work.

4. Not Everyone Will Connect With Bear:

The film intentionally centers on a protagonist whose obsession creates much of the horror.

That makes thematic sense, but it can also create emotional distance for some viewers.

Especially after he begins to understand what he did. The abuse he did.

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🎥 If You Liked This, You Might Also Enjoy

1. Smile: for psychological dread and supernatural terror.

2. The Fly: for tragedy mixed with horror.

3. Hereditary: for emotional devastation and escalating dread.

4. The Substance: for body horror and obsession themes.

5. Christine: for destructive obsession and supernatural influence.

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⭐ Rating: 6.6 / 10

Obsession succeeds because it understands that the scariest horror often comes from recognizable emotions.

Loneliness.

Desire.

Regret.

The film takes a fantasy many people have imagined and transforms it into a nightmare about control, dependency, and the dangers of mistaking obsession for love.

It isn't just asking whether Bear gets what he wants.

It's asking whether what he wants was ever really love in the first place.

And that question makes the film far more disturbing than any monster ever could.

Honestly, the Gen Z hype around this movie is baffling. What happened to this generation's standards? Have you watched Fight Club, Se7en, Interstellar, The Prestige, or The Silence of the Lambs and there is a lot more those are films that truly earn their reputation.

Obsession isn't even in the same conversation. I went into Obsession with high expectations. The reviews and audience response had built it up as one of the greatest horror films of the 21st century. While I can appreciate some aspects of the film, I ultimately found it disappointing.

The atmosphere is effective, and there are moments that genuinely feel unsettling. The film does a decent job of portraying emotional discomfort and toxic relationships. The performances are generally strong.

However, the pacing is a major issue. It takes far too long for the film to become engaging, and many scenes feel unnecessarily stretched out. Instead of building tension, the slow pace often becomes tedious.

Another problem is the tone. During my screening, people laughed during scenes that seemed intended to be disturbing. I found myself laughing at times as well. The film struggles to decide whether it wants to be horror, psychological drama, or dark comedy, and that inconsistency weakens its impact.

The reveals are also poorly timed, reducing their emotional effectiveness. Additionally, the world of the film feels strangely limited and underdeveloped.

Ultimately, I do not think this works particularly well as a horror film. It feels more like a psychological drama with horror elements than a genuinely frightening experience.

The lead actress, however, was phenomenal and easily the best part of the movie. Her performance was a 10/10 and carried the film from start to finish.

10/10 acting. Terrible script. Massively overrated.

If you could wish for someone you love to love you back, would you have the courage to earn it yourself or would you force it through a wish?

Obsession starts with an intriguing premise and turns it into a creepy psychological horror story. The film is elevated by strong performances from both leads, who fully commit to the emotional intensity and unsettling nature of the story. The cinematography does a great job capturing the film's eerie atmosphere, while the sound design is one of its biggest strengths. Every silence, background noise, and audio cue adds tension, creating a constant sense of unease that keeps the horror effective throughout.

What held the film back for me is its repetitive storytelling. Once Nikki's obsession is established, the movie keeps returning to the same emotional beats and tantrums without offering much development. It becomes predictable how she will react whenever things don't go her way, making the second half feel less impactful than it should. Despite that, the atmosphere, performances, and technical aspects remain strong enough to keep the film engaging. Obsession may not reach its full potential, but it's still a creepy and entertaining watch with enough unsettling moments to satisfy horror fans.

The movie was watchable and the beginning was better to me than the end. The movie was less horror to me and more just trying to disturb you. It failed a few times for me, other times it was just nasty. The movie was also quite predictable. I predicted many scenes before or during the scene was rolling out. Some moments felt like they were just written to push the plot forward and wrap it up. As I said, the beginning to maybe half way was much better. I don't regret watching but I probably won't watch again.

The beginning sort of sparked in spite of the dismal acting by the secondary characters. The leading actress was amazing as an actress and the leading male was I suppose with the script handed to him, awkwardly okay. Not a jump out at you Brad Pitt, but not an Ed Powers either. He carried his dialogue for the money and the actress who was the lead stole the show. Just your regular programming folks! See it and try not to think about anything really important for awhile!

I've seen the great reviews and the high ratings on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb, but this movie just didn't do it for me. I just didn't "believe" the characters' motivations.

Unlike Jordan Peele and his ventures into horror films through a comedian's lens, Curry Barker is no Jordan Peele when it comes to putting together a great horror flick.

The plot revolves around a lonely geek named Bear, played by Michael Johnston, who has fallen hard for his coworker Nikki, portrayed by Inde Navarrette. Bear is firmly stuck in the "friend zone" and desperately wants to take the relationship to the next level, but he can never seem to find the right moment. Out of frustration, he buys a gag gift called the "One Wish Willow" and jokingly wishes for Nikki to love him more than anything else in the world. Unfortunately for Bear, she does...to horrifying results.

It's here where the film completely loses me. Nikki keeps doing increasingly bizarre and disturbing things to prove her devotion. The entire time I watched the movie, I kept asking myself one simple question: why didn't Bear just tell her to stop? If she loved him more than anything, wouldn't she listen to what he wanted? That obvious logic gap became impossible for me to ignore. Instead of getting wrapped up in the horror unfolding on screen, I spent the second half of the movie distracted by what felt like a giant plot hole.

If you can overlook that issue, there are some genuinely effective jump scares, and the film definitely delivers enough gore to satisfy hardened horror fans. Barker does show flashes of creativity behind the camera, but the screenplay simply wasn't strong enough for me to fully buy into the madness.

Overall, I'd give "Obsession" 5 out of 10, a middle of the road movie. It's pretty "meh" in my opinion, but that's just me.

I truly don't understand how everyone is giving this movie super high scores... it is a wannabe Misery that an influencer is trying to make and does not deliver. I gave it a 5 because the main actress did do a really good job at being creepy but other than that it was predictable and her yelling/crying was the most annoying sound. If you want to watch a good scary movie in the theater right now go see hokum not this.

Honestly, this may get unfavorable takes. The actors and cinematography were great. No complaints there. However, the story line is old and repeated time and time again. Which, is not bad either. However, there was nothing for this story that related to modern times. This movie may well have been placed 30 years ago and it would have worked. No social media influence to the "wish" story line. Being super specific to a wish has been a tale since stories were invented. I'm all about repeat stories, I just wish this movie played more on modern obsession tactics. Otherwise it just felt like another 80s thriller in a time where we don't live anymore and is not relatable. It was an entertaining movie just not what I expected from a new age director and producer. Enjoyed it nonetheless!

Two note characters which didn't connect for me. Hard to root for anyone.

Wish the first 45ms did more to round out the characters and had a more developed sub plot. Acting was incredible

Ending was weird in the right ways.

Hoping a better version of the premise emerges in the next cycle of psychological thrillers.

If you've read or watched *any* stories about wishing someone to love you, you know what's going to happen all the way through. That being said it's a story well told and keeps your interest until the end.

There's a moderate level of gore, so if that bothers you be aware.

The ending may leave you a bit unsatisfied but it's a decent ending to this telling.

I think most of us experience unreciprocated feelings at one point or another, so suddenly having the power to make that person return those feelings is quite a fun premise to play with. The idea of "forcing" someone to be with you against their true will or how this could backfire is an interesting idea to explore, but unfortunately, the film never meaningfully does anything with this theme other than using it to shock the audience.

Inde Navarrette is undeniably a brilliant actress so my issue isn't necessarily with her abilities, but more so with how her abilities were applied. While she is certainly committed to this performance, sometimes the director seems to lean on her ability to intensely scream more than what is actually needed, leading to the performance bordering on obnoxious. IMO a little bit of subtlety here and there would've worked better than her screaming like a banshee throughout the entire runtime which began feeling both repetitive and even worse, totally annoying.

Ever since Toni Collette's performance in Hereditary, it seems like a lot of horror movies have been chasing that same dramatic performance that Toni delivered with the animalistic crying and all, leading to a trend of "over-acting" in modern horror. It's not that I don't appreciate strong acting, but it often comes off as very "try-hard" or forced when such an emotional performance is inserted when the plot itself isn't heavy enough to warrant it.

Without spoiling anything, I felt it was pretty on the nose they were borrowing heavily from Betty Gabriel in Get Out, also borrowing tropes from The Exorcist, and even from more recent horror like Talk to Me. While being influenced by other movies isn't automatically a problem, the references felt a little too visible at times where this was constantly reminding me of other films I liked more.

The moral of the story is to be careful what you wish for but technically speaking, the protagonist's wish was for this woman to love him, not for her to turn into some kind of demon, so I don't think he exactly got what he wished for even if that is the overall takeaway of the story.

Overall, I had a fun time with Obsession and I don't regret seeing it, although I was admittedly laughing more than I felt any tension. With that said, my opinion is in the minority as you can tell from all of the hype, so I'd still recommend giving it a watch despite my complaining. For me, it's a 5 out of 10.

Full disclosure - My rating is low and it is not just because the CBFC ruined the experience with their unjustifiable cuts but also due to the dimly lit print itself which was unsatisfactory.

Curry Baker's Obsession is about the extremely introvert Baron "Bear" Bailey who simply doesn't beleive he deserves anything good in life. He loses his pet cat and continues to chicken out from expressing his feelings to his crush Nikki. When he comes across an occult shop to buy Nikki a gift, he buys a one wish willow, a novelty toy that grants, well that one wish. He does exactly the same and wishes for Nikki to love him back. Thus starting the "be careful what you wish for" as Nikki falls obsessively in love with him and it gets instantly suffocating but the goodie guy Bear, still has no confidence himself in knowing what he truly wants or how to take responsibility. As Nikki's behavior turns violent, his friends Ian and Sarah, worry for Bear. Will Bear be able to reverse the wish and save Nikki, forms rest of the story.

For someone who loved Ruby Sparks without the one wish willow, the core concept is not too novel. But what makes Curry Baker, a director to look out for, is how committed he is towards his craft. There is crystal clear clarity in what he is trying to make and there is no deviation from his vision. The narrative is driven by the strong performance of Inde Navarrette as Nikki and Curry Baker simply doesn't hold back. She is the real star of the film and the film just pushes her to the extreme with each creepy scene. The narrative remains largely one note with no surprises in the tale which is not a bad thing. The final outcome is rather predictable so the last act, is all about the shock value. The controlled budget doesn't hamper the experience even though the censor board played the main spoilsport. It is definitely the uncomfortable scenes that makes it a must watch and the dark humor remains spot on throughout.

So the concept here is good, the acting is excellent, the directing for a newbie is fantastic...but there are WAY too many plot holes for this to get a better review from me. So much left unexplained, so much inconsistency in characters. I know not everything needs to be explained, and vagueness can be a powerful builder of mystery and suspense, but there was just way too much that didn't fit with the core concept of the film. Entertaining, but left a lot to be desired.

My opinion might be tainted by a bad theater experience. I will rant on that later.

I was planning on waiting for streaming to avoid inconsiderate idiots, but they scrapped the planned June 2nd streaming date since it was making tons of money. So I finally went to make sure it doesn't get spoiled.

This is a generally well made movie. There are lots of creepy parts, great performances (omg Inde), and one really great jaw-dropping moment. At times, it reaches the levels needed to satisfy the hype. At times.

It also has a ton of gross out horror which does zero for me. Puke, piss and dead animals are not scary to me. It's stuff I'd rather not see. And the vast majority of this movie is slow build up and in between calmer moments.

I think it's a solid movie but the hype has been blown way out of proportion. I may give it a second chance and see if I like it better, but I doubt it goes higher than 7 stars.

(1 viewing, 6/3/2026)

Rant on inconsiderate theater goers: Even weeks after its release, at a 10:30 PM Wednesday night showing, this was nearly sold out. And people were openly talking, phones came out hundreds of times, people took pictures with the flash on multiple times, people showed up 45 minutes after the stated showtime (30 minutes into the movie).

When this happens, it's so hard to stay in the movie, to feel the vibe it's going for. And it's gotten to the point where I may stop going to the theater all together. People are the worst.

I would pay extra, even double, if they had "quiet showings." Have security in the theater at all times, no phones, no talking, no showing up after the movie starts. Otherwise I'll just watch at home.

It was mostly the trailer that got me hyped for the movie, and I was lucky to be able to see it in a pre premiere a few days before the actual premiere. The movie is very well put together. The lightning is really well done, special effects are good and the soundtrack is suspenseful, and the acting is overall really good as well, although the crying at the end right before the credits really needs some work. That wasn't good.

But...

The movie is just too long for the kind of movie this is. It's very slow paced which doesn't help either. It's not exactly a slow burn horror that it slowly picks up the pace towards the end. Yes, more stuff happens towards the end then the beginning, but pacing wise nothing changes that much. It's still slow paced all the way through. I also couldn't really see the humor in it so I don't see why others keep saying it's comedic, it really isn't. While they make good use of lightning and shadows, the movie's overall brightness is just too low. I had to strain my eyes a few times to even see what was on the screen. The supernatural part was also barely there. A person going completely crazy isn't supernatural in itself. The one wish willow mostly served as a plot device and that's pretty much it. No lore behind it or anything, which would really made the movie a lot better.

All these things made the movie in my opinion just "okay"

After all the glowing reviews I perused here, I had to see this movie; it sounded like a blend of comedy and horror like "Evil Dead II," and that's one of my favorite horror films.

Alas, these reviewers must be babies if they thought "Obsession" was scary. I was yawning through the first two acts, thinking, "when do we get to the good parts?", but it just took so damn long to get moving. The last act at least had a couple of moments of horror and gore, but not much.

On top of that, the Baron/"Bear" leading man here is such a wuss, I was PRAYING Nikki would bloody him up; for the sake of fairness, I must point out this wasn't the actor's fault, but the screenwriter's---in making Bear so distastefully effeminate and unlikeable, the viewer could care less about him.

Curry Barker got lucky with OBSESSION, but now that he's pocketed his own form of a "One Wish Willow," i.e., a coveted "Golden Ticket" to make practically any damn movie he wants due to OBSESSION's voluminous box office receipts, let's see if he can do better. 6/10.

If there is any problem with this film that lowers it's enjoyment is that everything is from the male characters POV. In fact, it is so grounded in how he is affected by his own actions that we get little insight into what he puts the woman he supposedly loves through. In fact, I would not be surprised if film goers walked away seeing him as the victim.

In many ways, the film's premise could be played for straight comedy where a poor schlub who just wants love falls for a psycho. Honestly, take out the violence and up the jokes and you've got an Adam Sandler movie from the 90s. And that's a shame. I think seeing a lot more of what happens to Nikki, the woman who is wished into her obsession, and having her fight back would have made this a stronger film.

As it is, it's good but not great. I think strong acting by all around and excellent direction helps lift what is actually a rather weak script.

Great performance by the female lead, and the rest of the cast was pretty solid too , but what I find to be the biggest problem is that from the very beginning everything is all laid bare , you know exactly the arc and direction it will take , there is nothing else besides the initial hook, no twist , mysteries or questions to surprise you and keep you engaged on a deeper level.

There is nothing wrong with having a straight forward history , but when there are other movies out there like Bring Her Back (2025) that are in my opinion much more interesting not only story telling wise , but better paced and with tension to keep you at the edge of your seat with an average of 7,1 I would not give this movie a punctuation above or equal to that, it is a solid 6 in my opinion .

Hope it helps and thank you for reading.