“Control Freak” Review

There’s a better film that is literally itching to get out with Control Freak. The diagnosis is familiar: a horror short given a feature-length extension leads to more expansion by running time than storytelling. It’s a film that repeats itself, hoping the abundance of torture and trauma will fill in the gaps of a one-note self-help satire. It’s the standard package for a horror film that could say more in a few minutes instead of 104.

Despite the setting, Kelly Marie Tran does have a knack for horror. She plays Val, a motivational speaker who helps others with their lives while refusing to address her issues. As with many horror protagonists, she’s haunted by a past of darkness and death that lingers in her mind. A body horror angle is pursued in how she continuously scratches at her head, struggling through her thoughts and feelings on the death of her mother. The problem is not much of that festering of repression can, well, fester. The body horror and trauma become more of a prop for a mystery, where revelations of addiction and inherited curses.

The ultimate monster Val must face is the demonic Sanshi, a beast with the look of a folk legend and the mouth of a psychological antagonizer. He slowly emerges from behind Val’s subconscious, where he spouts suicidal acceptance, encouraging her to end it all. The wheels turn slowly with a film like this, where it’s clear that Val must champion her lesser thoughts and learn from her family’s past mistakes. This story could use some grease as it crawls to the most lacking body horror and underwhelming demon defeating.

Control Freak isn’t in control enough to be a freaky horror, settling for more of a typical trauma trip. With all the meandering in the torture and repetition of the most common theme in modern horror, any greater examination of generational anxieties or gross-out gore is lost in a film that never takes off from its short-film foundation. It continues to scratch the same itch over and over, hoping that there’s something beyond the blood and pain. While that mindset is commonly labeled with insanity, this case can be filed under mundanity.