Sissy Review

PLOT: Teen best friends Cecilia and Emma, after a decade run into each other. Cecilia is invited to Emma’s bachelorette weekend. But now she’s stuck in a remote cabin with her high school bully, with a taste for revenge.

REVIEW: If you’ve ever experienced bullying, then Sissy may be an uncomfortable watch at first. The idea of having your childhood bullies reintroduced to your life, and then going away with them for a weekend sounds like a horror movie in and of itself. But then add the actual horror twist of revenge? Then you’ve got yourself an interesting time at the movies.

The title of the film comes from Aisha Dee’s character, Cecilia, also known as Sissy. And it is not an easy role to portray. It would all too easy for Sissy to be extremely unlikable and self-centered yet Dee is able to bring a level of humanity to the role, even in dark moments. But that didn’t stop me from constantly shouting at the screen “What are you doing?” Because this girl makes bad decision after bad decision. First, she decides to go off on a long weekend with a bunch of people she hasn’t seen in many years. Then she sees that one of the girls REALLY doesn’t want her there. At what point does someone recognize these may be red flags and get out of dodge? Oh right, there’s a movie to be finished. And it’s not the movie you may think it is.

Sissy does a fantastic job of showing just how reliant on social media Cecilia is. But it doesn’t just show it in a vain way, we’re also able to see the chemical reactions that just make her more and more dependent on the positive comments. It makes some of her decision-making in the second half make a little more sense. And it was fun to see the other girl’s cut down the job of a social media influencer, as I was a little worried they’d glorify it.

This is a tough film to talk about without going into spoilers so instead, I’ll talk about a specific moment I loved from the film that is inconsequential. Sissy puts on a face mask and it’s called “Elon Mask” which is so dumb that it’s probably one of my favorite jokes of the year. I feel like it would be a disservice to the screenplay if I didn’t mention it here. But otherwise, the characters mostly just “woo!” and make themselves out to be just terrible human beings.

There are a lot of conflicting emotions when it comes to the characters in this film. Even the awful ones don’t deserve the fate they receive and even the “good ones” end up being pretty terrible people. The main bully Alex (Emily De Margheriti) is one of the more grating in recent memory. The way she just picks at Cecilia and it’s revealed that she’s the one that gave Sissy her nickname, making her an easy one to hate. But even the others aren’t much better. Which just adds to the wonderful grey area that the film resides. It truly asks the question: Is there any justification for murder?

Hannah Barlow, who also stars as Emma, wrote and directed the film along with Kane Senes. They do a fantastic job here of really bringing us along for this journey like no other. The score by Kenneth Lampl features a lot of sustained piano notes that really give the movie a creepy feel. Then the strings come in at the right times making it feel straight out of the 70s. Coupled with the very slick cinematography and I’d say its atmosphere is one of its chief attributes.

By the end of its runtime, I was ready to completely start the movie over and experience it all again. I love a film that takes you on a harrowing journey with a character. This does so in a way that I can’t say I’ve seen done before. The deaths were absolutely hard-hitting and brutal, while still being done practically. While I wouldn’t go all the way in calling it a slasher, it certainly scratches a similar itch. And I can’t wait for audiences to meet Sissy.

Sissy is STREAMING ON SHUDDER SEPTEMBER 29TH, 2022

Sissy

AMAZING

9