Horror in the late 1990s and early 2000s, particularly the J-Horror boom, focused on current-era technology somehow incorporating age-old evils. Particularly we had cursed bits of tech, be it the internet in Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Pulse, mobile phones in Takashi Miike’s One Missed Call, or most famously a VHS tape in Hideo Nakata’s Ring. Roughly 30 years later, what tech can instill such fear in people? One route might be AI, but there’s something very un-classic about that. No, I think writer-director Ian Tuason nailed it with Undertone by focusing on paranormal podcasts, audio recordings, and analog horror. Does it mean the movie wholly works? Well, not quite.
It’s interesting to look at a movie like Undertone—which A24 picked up—because its central gimmick is so strong, so wholly and thoroughly adhered to, that discussing the other aspects seem trite, like I’m missing the point. However, it’s in those elements that seem in some ways glossed over or underbaked that keep the film from going beyond clever and effective to true nightmare fuel that resonates long after the credits roll.
The story of Undertone follows Evy (Nina Kiri), a young woman with the horrible and unenviable task of keeping her dying, deeply religious mother (Michèle Duquet) comfortable until she eventually passes. Mama, as Evy calls her, doesn’t eat, is never awake, and merely breathes shallowly. Evy has to wait until she hears the death rattle. An awful circumstance. Evy also just found out another major piece of news that puts her possible future in question.
Evy is also a podcaster (join the club!), co-hosting the paranormal exploration show The Undertone. Evy is the unerring skeptic, while her partner, Justin (Adam DiMarco), believes so much that he’s put Agent Mulder to shame. Justin has recently received a mysterious email with 10 audio recordings on it and—because this is a movie—he and Evy decide to listen to them for the first time on-air. The recordings detail a series of strange occurrences befalling a couple, Jessa and Mike, with the former talking in her sleep. These recordings—conveniently spread across three podcast taping sessions—begin to paint a picture of some sort of demonic entity. Naturally, this all has something to do with Evy and her mom, because it’s a modern horror movie.
First and foremost, I want to applaud writer-director Tuason for holding so firm to the central gimmick of Undertone. Other than Kiri and Duquet, every single other character in the movie is merely a voice, either on the phone, over the internet, or otherwise off-camera. As a result, we spend 95% of the movie staring at Evy’s face as she either says things or listens to things. That could wear thin if not for Kiri’s magnetic performance or the pervasively creepy feeling the cinematography gives. Anywhere in the house (where we are the entire film) seems like it could have something scary hiding in the shadows. And maybe it does!
Naturally, the other and bigger gimmick is the reliance on sound. The marketing for Undertone quotes another reviewer saying it’s “the scariest movie you’ve ever heard,” which is a pretty great line. We listen to spooky things along with Evy, and the sound design and mix are nothing short of impeccable. It’s almost an ASMR video, but scary. So it does do what it says on the tin. And yet.
At various times during Undertone, I noted how it feels like other movies. J-Horror titles, as I listed above, yes, but also innovators like The Blair Witch Project, massive hits like Hereditary, and other experimental indies like Skinamarink. Consequently, if I’m thinking these things, I’m not really paying attention to the movie. On the one hand, it’s impressive that Tuason got the premise to 93 minutes, but on the other, it’s often so painfully contrived on its way there.
The story only works if a number of things happen how and exactly when they need to for things to resonate at the right time. I could see (or hear) every tension-ratcheting moment coming because I could tell what kind of moment needed to happen next. For example: how convenient that neither Evy nor Justin listened to any of the audio clips until the recording for the episode. What if they’d been nothing? What if they’d been stupid? Justin miraculously finds the exact thing he needs on every Google search, Evy knows exactly when to say they should stop recording to give it narrative punch. It just feels so written.
That said, because the gimmicks work so well, Undertone still manages to succeed more than it doesn’t. However, I saw the movie at a screening in Dolby Atmos, the best possible setting for something like this. If your local theater, or your home setup down the road, doesn’t have the best sound setup, would even the best parts of the movie still work? I’m not sure.
Undertone is an effective and clever little horror flick that uses the paranormal podcast and analog horror obsessions of the 2020s, plus some phenomenal sound design, to tell a story you’ve probably seen before. Doesn’t make it less enjoyable to watch, it just means it doesn’t resonate as deeply as it could have.
Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Letterboxd.