Obsession (2026) is good horror

I was urged by two close friends to watch this movie, specifically in theaters. I normally don’t watch horror, but these two normally don’t recommend movies or shows—so I had to check it out. Below are some of my thoughts after watching.

Immediate impression §

This was a really good movie. Horror movies with inventive ways to sustain tension are really rare to come by. And this one was a brilliant orchestration.

On first thought I’d say the premise was unique and centrally compelling. But thinking about it, that isn’t quite right: the premise is itself not so remarkable. Really, it’s just: we overshoot our wishes, we seek to go where we actually don’t want to be. What’s so compelling about Obsession is more its self-coherence, the selection of elements to constitute a perfect storm.

This is the shifty trait I see as intrinsic to exceptional works of art.

In the context of this movie (and its genre: horror), it’s how it “sustains tension” so effortlessly, a series of moments spontaneous enough to present themselves as merely the contingent unfolding of events. Of course the whole movie is orchestrated—but it’s precisely the motion of naturalness that backgrounds the viewer’s present act of watching and foregrounds the moments that unfold as moments (not as “orchestrated moments in a movie”). A kind of self-propulsion of the inevitable. The phenomenology is: to take spectating out from the spectacle and to take up (occupy) the bodies on the screen.

Reflections §

You know, I was talking with Aaron and realized something unique/rare about the movie. It’s the closeness of Nikki. She’s kept close to Bear—too close (which references the title and probably one of the main symbolic messages of the film). It creates a disturbing sense of claustrophobia, I’d say, for the viewer: the source of horror looms over your shoulder, at the back of your head, and an unceasing threat—and in the movie, it’s precisely manifest as those moments where Nikki stares hidden from a corner, when she stands motionless inside the door frame, when she cuddles in bed with Bear; then cashed in and realized in other moments by the opposite: startling movement, say, when she dashes into view and bashes Sarah’s head in.

Compare this to the typical horror movie. Almost always the source of horror starts distant and gets closer (in the “felt,” phenomenological sense, but also sometimes literally). It’s the cookie cutter way to create scenarios where directors can have an excuse insert the typical jumpscare or “running away to safety”- or “readying to confront and battle the monster”-type scene.^[1] But because of this, the rhythm of the horror becomes predictable and template: the viewer can feel the rising and receding action, alongside the climaxes and dips. On the other hand, Obsession works by having the source of horror felt constantly.

But Obssession is ingenious here: the reason the typical horror flick doesn’t try to do the same thing is because it can’t. If you just place the “horrifying monster” around the corner or in the room of every scene, then the shock value of the monster disappears; it’s no longer scary. In those movies, the monster is horrifying precisely because it isn’t seen. So usually the source of horror can’t just always be seen. Obsession gets away with it because of its premise + selection of elements. Nikki is a girlfriend who wants to stay close to Bear, and Bear wants to stay close to Nikki. Naturally, Nikki stays over at Bear’s place and sleeps in his bed with him. He goes to work (with lunch she’s prepared) and returns home to her. He wakes up in the morning with her having prepared breakfast or reading. He wakes up during the night and she’s in the corner of the room staring at her. She’s always there, and the claustrophobic proximity is disturbing. (Even when she’s “actually scary and deranged” and not “trying to be normal but terrifying,” her physical proximity to the character is uncomfortable.)

Speaking of which, I should amend one of my opening remarks, taking it further: I said Nikki keeps close to Bear, but I think it’s better to say Nikki is kept close by Bear. Of course Nikki’s possession or curse (or whatever you want to call it) means she’s always trying to be with Bear, but Bear is the one who allows her to keep close (and, it goes without saying, Bear is the one whose wish caused all this). That’s the kicker and tension in the movie: Bear isn’t running from the horror, his attraction to it (Nikki) is what makes it scary, it’s the source of the tension. (And, of course, the philosophical rub is that Bear had many chances to try backing out of the deal or even undo its harm but he decides not to—he knows something is wrong from the beginning, he rejects the lending hands of those in his life, he doesn’t share what he did to his friends so that they could brainstorm solutions together since he doesn’t want to take accountability for what he did (or wanted), he learns that his suicide can save real Nikki but doesn’t turn to that option until the very end, and when he does he fails to build to courage to shoot himself, and when he opts instead to go out the gentle way, by overdosing on pills, he chickens out and changes his mind^[2].) The viewer wants to get away from Nikki and out of the situation but is forced to embrace Bear’s desire, watching the avoidable disaster live, to try and scrounge a relationship Nikki, the source for horror. That proximity to what shouldn’t be proximal is how the movie naturally generates tension in almost every scene.

Speaking of Nikki: I think her character as the source of the horror is also interesting. It’s unlike the typical horror monster. Usually, the monster is either transparently evil—it chases you, wants to harm you, wants to attack your friends and family, and so on—or it’s horrifying by being mysterious, cryptic, and creepy. Nikki is neither: she’s sentient and wants to do good (in combination with, of course, forceful violence). Of course, she doesn’t do good—but it’s the fact that she has aims to please: it’s just that it’s a sick, twisted version of good; she’s so single-minded and infatuated that what she does edges into the demented.