Mark Reviews Movies: UNFRIENDED: DARK WEB

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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 19, 2018

Sometimes, it's the little changes that make all the difference. Such is the case with Unfriended: Dark Web, a mostly unconnected sequel to the 2015 horror movie about a literal ghost in a machine killing off a group of obnoxious teenagers. The connections between this film and Unfriended are present here, but they're primarily superficial. There's the title, of course, and there's also the central gimmick, in which the entirety of the story is told by way of a computer screen.

The changes are relatively slight. It's still a horror story about a group of people who eventually are killed off one by one by an always-present but esoteric threat. This time, writer/director Stephen Susco has dropped the supernatural angle, which gave the original movie a heavy layer of silliness to go along with the tedium of watching vapid teens play around with their computers.

The source of the danger in the sequel is tangible but still quite mysterious, as a group of friends find themselves unwittingly exploring the so-called "dark web," an untraceable part of the internet where people who want to do, well, dark things have the freedom to so. There are physical threats here—people on the other side of that internet connection, who want to keep their wicked dealings a secret and are willing to kill if their work is threatened.

There's something far scarier about this conceit, if only because it seems plausible. Yes, Susco's screenplay takes the idea of a shadowy cabal of weirdos to the extreme, as multiple killers in hooded sweatshirts seem capable of appearing anywhere at will. That's part of the terror here, as the number of people involved in this section of the dark web just keeps climbing during a climactic vote to determine the fate of one of our protagonists—in their mind, just another plaything. These people are everywhere and could be anyone.

As for our protagonists, they're older in the sequel, and as opposed to the self-centered and cruel teenagers of the original, they also seem comparatively normal and decent. The central figure is Matias (Colin Woodell), a guy who just has picked up a "new" used laptop. He's working on a program that will convert his speech to American Sign Language in video chat, so that he can better communicate with his girlfriend Amaya (Stephanie Nogueras), who is deaf. The relationship has hit a rough patch, and it's nice that, in the midst of all the anxiety and the screaming, Susco actually gives us a sense of what has gone wrong in this relationship and why.

The rest of the characters are made up of Matias' friends, who are chatting online together for their regular game night. Serena (Rebecca Rittenhouse) has just proposed to her girlfriend Nari (Betty Gabriel). Damon (Andrew Lees) is a computer expert living in London, whose main purpose here is to spout and explain all the technical jargon. Lexx (Savira Windyani) is a DJ with a fancy mixing station set up in her apartment, and AJ (Connor Del Rio) is a conspiracy theorist who makes web videos to spread the "truth" from his parents' basement. These aren't particularly robust characters, but we do feel bad enough for them as the walls of the cabal's own game close in around them.

One of the things that's most improved here is a sense of narrative purpose to the protagonist's use of the computer. Early on, there's some seemingly random browsing of various websites and programs, but Susco gives us a sense of the unknown from the start. Those websites and programs have log-in information saved to them from the laptop's previous owner. Eventually, as the previous owner begins receiving messages from random people, Matias can't hold back on the temptation to explore the former owner's online profile and hidden files. There's a genuine sense of tension with each click and with each incoming message, especially once the previous owner starts sending his own messages from the social networking account of a "friend."

If the threat is tangible here, so, too, is the primary way of communicating the threat—and in which the threat communicates. The computer feels less like a shallow gimmick and more like a puzzle to solve. The notion of a puzzle gives this story, which mostly revolves typing and clicking, a fine sense of momentum.

Soon enough, Matias' friends become involved in solving the mystery behind the computer and its hidden video files, snatched from wireless connections in an ordinary neighborhood. A program takes Matias to the dark web, where bounties of millions of dollars are placed on unsuspected victims via anonymous text chats. Messages from the former owner appear in thick, black text and disappear, lest anyone but Matias figure out what's happening. The members of the secret society appear in videos and in Matias' chat windows with a kind of digital camouflage—as if they're scrambling the internet connection to keep their presence hidden from any prying eyes online.

It's unnerving because Susco takes us through the steps of uncovering the mystery with clarity. It also feels real enough, even if the antagonists seem as preternaturally predatory in the real world as they do in the worldwide web. There's a cruel ingenuity to the way the group tracks down and does away with Matias' buddies that only seems one step removed from reality—or that, in one case of fooling the police to do the dirty work for them, is all too real. Unfriended: Dark Web is a vast improvement over its predecessor, and as a standalone story, it's a chilling and occasionally nasty horror film about the terrible potential within anonymous misanthropes.

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