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Sunday, May 5, 2019

MARVEL-LESS MARVISTA: He Knows Your Every Move (aka Deadly Hack) (2018)

Director: Lane Shefter Bishop
Writer(s): Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch
Starring: Drew Seeley, Rosalie McIntire, Sofia Pernas, and Andrew Kai


Once again, I have to wonder something aloud that I've asked many times before in the limited time I've been reviewing them: Just how self-aware is MarVista to the quality of their movies? I mean, they obviously follow the same formulas, and they are popular enough to be a multi-million dollar studio, but they have to be aware that people are laughing at them and not with them…right?


The latest evidence is He Knows Your Every Move, a movie that feels as if it was written by an elderly person inspired by a meme about identity theft that they received on Facebook. It’s a series of increasingly frustrating yet predictable sequences that quickly build up far beyond the scope of reality, and into a bizarre alternate universe, where women are completely oblivious to the bright red flags of sociopathic behavior, and the bright red flash of a webcam that always seems to be on, even when it’s not in use.

Molly is a highly successful recipe vlogger who has everything she thinks she needs in her life…except, a man. She feels she doesn’t have time for one, but of course her friends know her better than she does, so they push her into the dating scene. Her reluctant decision to date based on her pushy friends becomes a little less reluctant when she has a run-in with Jack during one of her daily jogs. He's a (mildly) handsome, charming man; between that and the few common interests they share right off the bat, that’s enough to win her over. Before you know it, they’re on their first date, then in bed together (MarVista's getting edgy!).

The “coincidences” mount with alarming intensity: he likes the same under-the-radar restaurant in Akron, OH (so much that he recites the name of the place before she does); likes the same bands and the same kinds of movies; constantly bumps into her in completely random places; speaks as if he is reciting carefully-choreographed sentences (though that just may be the acting; hard to tell in some of these movies); and, in perhaps the most telling characteristic, refuses to talk about his past, always changing the subject when pressed for information. Any one of these things would at least start to raise a red flag: any combination of two would put most people on high-alert. But to have ALL of those things in common…well, I’d say you have a better chance of making a perfect NCAA tournament bracket.

Once it all comes out and he makes his sociopathic tendencies known, the extent to which this man terrorizes her life from having access to her computer is hilariously over-the-top, as he is able to drain her bank account (AND ADD fraudulent charges FROM THE PAST), show up anywhere uninvited, send alternate (read: sexy and inappropriate) photos to her boss in lieu of a very important assignment, email plagiarized recipes for the same assignment, kidnap her ex-boyfriend, track her locations via a necklace he gave her (and that she curiously still wears, even after breaking up) and—in perhaps the most heinous, heartless act the world has ever seen—leave a one-star Yelp review for the restaurant her and her friends frequent. So much weight do her words carry (despite the fact no one at all seems to recognize her out in public) that, as a result of said review, the restaurant loses 90% of its business literally overnight. Oh, and did I mention that the token black friend—who is the first to voice concern about his actions, before agreeing they should get married not ten seconds later—is a police officer?

None of the ensuing mess is helped by the reactions to Molly’s apparent “meltdown”, in which no one at all believes her, despite this being completely out-of-character for her: The bank places a freeze on her account “while they investigate” citing that the fraudulent charges do not appear odd; her best friend believes she’s lying when she insists she didn’t invite Jack to her wedding reception, despite his history of doing such things; her boss forces her to take a leave of absence after receiving the plagiarized documents and sexy pictures, even though she would have no logical reason to do that; the restaurant’s manager is so devastated by her one-star review, that he can’t stop to realize for one second that she legitimately seems confused by the notion that she left his restaurant a poor rating, and probably wouldn’t show her face there again if she did. Really, all we learn is that basically everyone except Molly and her ex-boyfriend are complete pieces of shit.

The “ex”, while good-looking , takes some getting used to on a “personal level”, looking doofy and awkward in early scenes as his character (unmotivated stoner-rocker type) is established, and then randomly showing up to awkwardly linger around in later scenes just to show he still cares. He even proves to be relatively worthless as a hero, being kidnapped by the crazed kidnapper with, we imagine, very little effort of resistance.

By the end, though it's obvious he's one of the better aspects of the movie, along with the main star, who are attractive and decent enough actors that they would be able to carry the brunt of a “better” MarVista movie on their shoulders. But no one could save this epic turd of a movie, which is bad on so many levels that you’d swear the writer just Googled “identity theft” and believed the first paid search result that came up. Surely the studio knows this is a cringeworthy mess with no real redeeming qualities...right?

RIGHT?!

RATING: 2/10

TRAILER


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