One of Us

Worried, an investigative journalist pokes around into the disappearance of her best friend, and gets drawn into a small town religious cult. We enter their world through her eyes, at a seemingly benign coffee shop staffed with helpful, if peculiar, young women.

After following the women back to their compound and getting caught trespassing she's greeted warmly by their charismatic leader and only male in the group. It quickly becomes apparent that things are less idyllic than they appear.

The world is revealed in an authentic way at a pace that keeps the audience in its seat; story is weaved in a way that is both effective and creepy.

Give it a watch.

How in world did this bland snooze fest get labeled as a horror movie? It's barely even a psychological thriller. I've seen Disney channel originals with more tension and better acting. By the time it was over I was past caring what happened. I kept thinking that any minute something exciting would happen, but I was sorely disappointed. I mean, if your grandma came over and you wanted something tame to watch, this could work. I have a feeling that all of the good reviews for this movie are from people who made it. Save yourself the time and watch a Lifetime movie, where at least they're aware that the movie they're making is ridiculous.

A little bit of nuance and a delicate hand can go a long way towards making a movie - or, with their absence, breaking it. The premise behind 'One of us' is very promising, and it certainly caught my eye. It takes little time at all for the film itself to begin to show its difficulties, and the factors that limit our engagement. It's extraordinarily fast-paced, and almost forcefully brusque and heavy-handed. Many of its constituent parts are well done in and of themselves, but don't fit the tenor of what the picture is trying to do (immaculate hair and makeup work, for example); other aspects (not least those small touches intended to pointedly intone a horror element) are cliched and overdone; little or nothing is Just Right (this is also weirdly overproduced). "Cliched and overdone" also absolutely applies to dialogue, which is often entirely too on the nose; characters mostly feel like sketches that weren't completed, though some (such as Sophie) are downright excessive and gauche as written. Scene writing and too many plot points oscillate between lacking and unconvincing, forced and inorganic, or even imitative and false. With all this in mind, onto what can the narrative meaningfully latch, form its roots, and grow? What could we truly hope for in terms of character development? I recognize acting skill in the cast, but what can their best efforts hope to achieve?

Though not all of them fit together or are necessary, there are lots of great ideas in this feature. Horror, thriller, drama - ostensibly with a psychological edge. That's what the premise suggests; that's what 'One of us' could have been and tries to be. In writing and in execution, however, the result is at best uneven; it seems sometimes like the movie doesn't actually known what it wanted to be. The picture is far too blunt and unsubtle to earnestly play in the space that it wants to, and so becomes weak, common, or even overbearing. I appreciate the effort everyone put into this; I don't think the finished product is altogether bad. It's simply not everything that it should have been, and would have been if more mindful care were taken at large. I'd love to say that I like this more than I do, yet there's an emptiness where the best impact should be. There are far worse titles one could find themselves watching, yet unless you're a huge fan of someone involved, I also can't particularly imagine any specific reason to spend time with this one. Let's just say that 'One of us' is a disappointing "almost" and leave it at that.

This was a nice surprise for a late night TV fright flick. While One of Us is clearly a psychological horror movie at heart, it's not dedicated to making the cheesiest, campiest, kill-fest imaginable. In fact, it seems to be trying to do something different. Speaking of camp, the director really seemed to take pride in capturing the atmosphere of the idyllic mountain setting. I'm not sure of the techniques, but the outdoor naturally lit shots were gorgeous. They had me kind of convinced, or at least intrigued, by the promise of a retreat away from the stresses of modern society…and the psychology that might drive someone to let a charismatic creeper take the wheel. Of course creepy cults can't last, and these women in the woods have to fight to stay alive, and while this film might not please the slasher film purists, it offers a bit of a stylish spin on the late night psycho creep show.

Now when i say "cult movie", i mean a literal cult movie, that is, a movie about cults. i found the depiction of the cult leader and his subjects to be very realistic and educational. i've had some experience deprogramming some of these type of people and let me tell you this movie gets the facts right. The leader does not come across as some raving lunatic, but rather as a friendly father figure or surrogate. Very well made movie with some great performances, particularly from the cult leader and the young women playing the cult members that have been indoctrinated.