Obsession
The world is full of warnings and curses couched in compliments: be careful what you wish for, may you live in interesting times. For timid “Bear” Bailey, floating in the friendzone with the object of his obsession, co-worker Nikki Freeman, practicing confessions of love he will never have the courage to deliver, the warning could not be more clear, the salesperson from whom he purchases the magical One Wish Willow telling him directly there are repercussions.
A missed opportunity on another not-date with the gang, what is there to lose by using the $6.99 novelty? The wish made that Nikki would love him more than anything in the world, perhaps it is that he has in a way unspoken to her committed himself that she begins to behave differently, seeing something new in him, vulnerable since the death of his beloved cat, for surely it could not be some supernatural power in a throwaway gimmick in a new age shop, could it?
Written and directed by Curry Barker, Michael Johnston and Inde Navarrette are Bear and Nikki, he a “nice guy” coasting along without direction or ambition, she the rare and genuine friend he silently adores who, never believing such a thing could happen, loses her mind over him, the sole focus of her attention, possessive, jealous, losing all rational thought in her desperate need to be with him all the time, their friends Ian and Sarah (Cooper Tomlinson and Megan Lawless) unable to comprehend her Obsession, thinking she is on drugs rather than under a spell.
Opening like a teenage indie film romantic comedy, the sudden shift of emotion is a burden upon Nikki, at first confusing her and in turn Bear, the girl he loved fading into shadow, her face increasingly hidden in backlit shots and the horror of what he has unleashed dawning on Bear, aware that he is the trigger but unable to believe it, that he now has the chance he has longed for but that, as was warned by Rupert Giles in Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered, that love spells are deadly, those afflicted by them losing all capacity for reason.
Worse, with her free will distorted and squeezed into a corner of her mind, her personality able to snap at any moment, as the new Nikki tries to keep him a prisoner in their relationship, is Bear’s realisation that the real Nikki is still fighting within, aware of what has been done to her by the man she trusted and begging for release, Navarette’s flipping between her aspects freaky and terrifying as she is in one breath tender and solicitous then screeching her lungs out, guaranteed to kill the mood at any party.
A grim traipse through The Twilight Zone, sad-eyed Bear practically a child himself, unable to cope with the situation he has created but ultimately fully responsible for it, Obsession is at times both creepy and disturbing, the tragedy of a man who wanted something out of his reach and took a shortcut to get it but finds in presuming control over another has sacrificed his own life choices, unleashing a monster whose beautiful face he once adored, a nightmare ‘til death do us part.
Obsession is on general release now
