TL;DR – This is a film built almost entirely on its vibe, and that is exactly why it works. Every small detail has been crafted to leave the hairs standing up on the back of your neck for the entire runtime.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film.

Backrooms Review Introduction

If you have ever dabbled in the online spaces, then you have probably come across the internet phenomenon that is the Backrooms. A slightly too illuminated or not illuminated enough office block that goes on for eternity, where things are just not quite right. It has the distinct visual style of being both familiar and also profoundly off-putting. Well, this has been bouncing around the World Wide Web for a decade or so, and one of the creators in the space has taken the jump to the big screen, so let’s take a look.   

So, to set the scene, in the 1990s, Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is a generally frustrated seller of tired house furniture. He wanted to be an architect, but for many reasons, he could never make that work. The Cap’n Clark’s Ottoman Empire is bleeding him dry with all these electricity bills, which Clark knows are wrong because he might be currently living in the store after his wife kicked him out. He has been working through this with his therapist, Dr Mary Kline (Renate Reinsve), but nothing seems to stick. But then, one night, when he was sleeping in the store, he heard some odd electric noises from the basement. Going to investigate, nothing seems out of the ordinary until something caught the corner of his eye. An echo, a strip, a remembrance of a door that should not be there. It is an odd office-like space with yellow carpets and inconsistent fluorescent lighting. However, the deeper Clark goes, the weirder it gets.       

It’s All in the Vibes

Honestly, this is a difficult review to write because a lot of the analytical features I would explore are not there or don’t feel as important here. Indeed, if I were to guess what the most important aspect of the film is, it would be the vibes. You need to be in a constant state of unevenness every single time they enter that space. This might be the best film since The Invisible Man in making you feel dread with its use of all that negative space. What is behind that next door, what is around the corner, and what is ready to sneak up behind you? It is those vibes that made the creepypasta so popular on the internet in the first place, and I am glad they kept it here.

The filmmakers use so many different techniques to bring that unsettling feeling. A good example of this is the creepiest use of Greetings in 55 Languages that I think I have ever seen put to film. Taking something that was meant to be a message of hope and twisting it in this way shifts something inside you. It is that profound intensity that sticks with you throughout the film, never letting you be grounded at any time while in the yellow rooms. I will also say, it sticks with you even after you have left the cinema. I watched it on the last session of the day, and then had to walk through an empty shopping centre [a mall for our American readers] with only the sounds of the whirling escalators and the tap of my shoes on the floor … I did not sleep well last night.   

Production Perfection

To get this much resonance with an audience, you need to make sure you get all the details of production right, even down to the prevalence of mid-drifts in the 1990s fashion scene. I do have to give a tremendous congratulations to the construction team that built the Backrooms sets because they were perfect in the way they projected both banality and menace all at the same time. Watching, you get the feeling of normalcy, the bland fluorescent lights overhead, the carpet picked by committee, and the floor plan constructed by someone who has no care for reality. But then you see all the small details that feel off, such as a sun shower in the depths of winter. Even if you are not consciously noticing all the wrong things, your brain clocks them on a deeper level, an almost uncanny valley level. It takes real skill in design and construction to pull that off and make it sit uncomfortably in the viewer’s mind. Oh, and nominate this film for all the sound work it did, that Foley team needs to be congratulated.

Let’s get Liminal    

What draws people to these stories is that they are a very modern version of an ancient narrative. You take something common or bland, like an office building or historically a forest, and then you twist it with magic, danger, and warning. Even before you discover there are monsters in the woods, you still know something is rotten in the state of Denmark. What happens to all the magical places once we have paved over them to build shopping malls? It also has this unpleasant way of weaponising nostalgia and transition, having you stuck in a limbo of a memory of a time long since passed. Using the old cameras is both an interesting filmmaking technique to situate you in a place and time, but also a way to create a claustrophobic feeling, the past is crushing you down.  

The Brass Tacks   

While we have danced around the feelings and atmosphere of the film, when we dive back down into the layers of narrative, plot, and characters, it does not always work. A lot of this film is banking on you being at least a touch familiar with the genre before going in, and I think a lot of people will get lost in the process. Using theory as the framing device between Clark and Mary was an interesting one, but even though both actors are giving their all, we spend more time with Clark, even though he is the less compelling character of the two. Bobby (Finn Bennett) & Kat (Lukita Maxwell) feel underutilised, given you have two of the best young actors in the business working for you. Finally, I think the way they framed the ending is going to upset people, even though it probably works in the context of the world they are inhabiting.

Recommendation

In the end, do we recommend Backrooms? If you are a fan of the YouTube short films or the genre, then absolutely, we will. If you are a fan of horror that really captures a mood, then we will also recommend it to you. However, I will say that this is a film that is very much about feelings rather than anything else, and if the vibe does not capture you, then you may find it a dull experience.

Have you watched Backrooms? Let us know what you thought in the comments below. If you liked Backrooms, we would recommend Iron Lung to you because it is also a horror film that bubbled up via YouTube. But also because it too is dealing with a production that is really leaning into the vibes of the thing and succeeding with a gusto you don’t often see.  

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Bluesky at @Tldrmovrev, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Feel free to share this review on social media and check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day. 


Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Backrooms
Directed by – Kane Parsons
Story by – Will Soodik
Based on – Kane Pixels’ Backrooms
Music by – Edo Van Breemen & Kane Parsons
Cinematography by – Jeremy Cox
Edited by – Greg Ng
Production/Distribution Companies – North Road Films, 21 Laps Entertainment, Atomic Monster, Oddfellows Pictures, Phobos, & A24
Starring – Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Mark Duplass, Lukita Maxwell, & Finn Bennett
With – Avan Jogia, Robert Bobroczkyi, Krista Kosonen, Ember Ambrose, Patrick Baynham, Rhiannon Roberts, & Dana Mahmood
Rating – Australia: M; Canada: 14A; Germany: na; New Zealand: M; United Kingdom: 15; United States: R