LUMI Reviews: Backrooms- Kane Parsons Needs to Get Off the Damn Computer

In 1959, Shirley Jackson released a horror novel by the name of The Haunting of Hill House. This, one of the most influential (and, in my opinion, finest) novels in the genre’s history, went on to be adapted into two films, two plays, a middling Netflix miniseries and an abridged Radio 4 retelling. Its DNA has since been found throughout the horror genre. In 2000, for example, House of Leaves was released onto shelves. A 700 page ergodic monstrosity, it was latched onto heavily by a subset of nascent internet culture who have never since allowed anyone to forget it exists. This subset is where Kane Parsons, in large part, traffics in his messy first feature. 

I will do my best to be kind to a 20-year-old’s first feature; I would hate it if someone were to pull up my last review on this blog and poke fun at my amateurish prose and meagre analysis. Many of my issues aren’t with Parsons himself, but rather Will Soodik’s screenplay.

The film begins with a brief POV shot-on-video segment giving a brief rundown of what the hell a Backrooms is. It ends with a jumpscare from a scary monster. Herein lies the biggest problem with this film. In House of Leaves, many passages deal with photojournalist Will Navidson exploring an infinitely vast, almost empty section of his new house — sound familiar? Within some of these passages, there are crossed out paragraphs describing a Minotaur (printed in red in some editions.)  Backrooms asks the bold question of “what if House of Leaves was about outrunning the Minotaur?” It makes sense; it’s a more ‘filmic’ idea. It, however, distracts from much of the intrigue carried by the original premise. Just make the rooms scary! If you’ve had the pleasure of seeing Michael Snow’s Wavelength (one of my favourite films; would easily recommend to anyone with 40 minutes to spare,) you’ll know it’s very easy to have rooms alone create a profound response.

I digress. We’re then introduced to Chiwetel Ejiofor’s character: furniture merchant, divorcé and all-round misanthrope Clark. It’s he who discovers an entrance to the eponymous Backrooms, before being driven mad by his quest to unlock its secrets. Ejiofor’s performance is decent, and certainly reminds you that he used to carry fantastic films on his back, but leaves a little to be desired. His descent into insanity feels a little truncated and sudden, however, and ultimately it ends up feeling rather forced. There is, however, a great period where his frenetic anxiety in the real world (the Frontrooms if you will) is immediately juxtaposed with total calm in the Back.

The film also takes Ejiofor’s character down a path of violence against women that at times skews very heavily into sensationalism. This is one of those times where race-blind casting can backfire, reproducing old harmful stereotypes about Black men. This comes across as unintentional on Parsons’ part, but I felt it bears considering.

Ejiofor plays alongside Renate Reinsve’s Mary Kline, Clark’s therapist. It was Reinsve who drew me to the film in the first place, after her stellar performance in last year’s Sentimental Value blew me away. She doesn’t disappoint by any means — she remains far more compelling than Ejiofor much of the time — yet the screenplay doesn’t give her all that much on which to chew. As a therapist, her character is beyond inept — this could be an intentional decision on the part of Parsons et al, but her failings are also consistent with the vast majority of cinema’s ‘good’ therapists, which inclines me towards the belief that the film is simply remembering others.

This shallow view of the psychological field is where one of the grander issues with the film lies. Backrooms makes a definitive statement on the origins of its eponymous location: psychogenic manifestation of undigested trauma. This is a perfectly serviceable explanation, if killing some of the mystique of the original 4chan post (a phrase I’m shocked to be typing,) however Parsons’ analysis of trauma is neither comprehensive, nor novel, nor even given enough time of day to carry much interest, while simultaneously being delivered so transparently to the audience that it can become incredibly patronising. 

Another issue, and the one for which I’m naming this write-up, is Parsons’ over-reliance on homages. It speaks to a great dearth of confidence (understandable at Parsons’ age, of course) that this film has many moments that feel like a retread of a retread. Portal, Control (though I’m willing to admit the scene that first comes to mind may have been an homage to PNG Kanye West chasing you through a hotel) even the set-piece from which the film derives its main poster, wherein Reinsve is squeezed through the sort of corridor that hides a loading screen: So much of the visual language of the film is recycled from 21st century video games that I cannot possibly understand how people don’t believe a 20-year-old directed this. At one point, a faint song in the background, recognisable to anyone who follows the Lost Media community as the Holy Grail Ulterior Motives plays, inciting a wince from me. These wink-to-camera references struck me as a protection from ambitious overreach that constrained the picture far beyond my liking.

Jeremy Cox’s cinematography also left me wanting more, as is par for the course with much of modern American cinema. The shot compositions are at times lazy (except for, strangely, within Clark’s office, which was very pleasantly discomforting,) and the approach to colour appears to start and end with “make it yellow, I guess.” There is, however, a pleasing artificiality to much of the exterior (or Frontrooms) shots. One in particular has the entire sky replaced with a suburban sprawl. That shot is something.

I’ve been very critical of this film so far, which might make it surprising that I strongly recommend it to anyone reading. It’s imperfect, certainly. However, there is a decently long segment, stretching from Ejiofor’s first appointment with Reinsve after entering the Rooms to the end of an ensuing second SOV segment, that I would call a near-perfect experience. It’s moody and unnerving and one of the better horror experiences I’ve had (though it’s a genre I don’t frequent; pinch of salt and all that.) That, and the fantastic score from Parsons and Edo Van Breemen as well as the truly astounding set construction are enough for me to defend the film’s value, while Parsons also demonstrates enough competence to keep him on my radar, until at least his sophomore feature.