Mean Spirited

This a slightly edited version of the review for Mean Spirited's world premiere at London FrightFest 2023.

There’s a lot of this around at the moment heavy use of social media to relay a story via a streaming service or the various interactive services that anyone can hook into now.

It allows a running commentary of the plot and character as well as being light and very manoeuvrable being sometime shot on little more than mobiles or lightweight cameras. The innovation is staggering, no doubt, but there’s at times less thought gone into the story, or so it appears.

That’s one conclusion the viewer could take from Mean Spirited which has a group of friends visiting another who left them for fame and fortune. Or rather Bryce (Jeff Ryan) walked out on Andy (Will Madden). The latter has since been producing his own online show, with plenty of adornments and a steady number of followers, though nowhere near the influence of the Thunderman (Bryce’s alter ego). With this deep resentment eating away at him he and his team set off for a weekend with Bryce. Ostensibly to try and repair a friendship that dates back to their childhood, it starts to go wrong almost at once as Andy starts to flea-bite Bryce about him leaving.

Back at Bryce’s palatial home strange things are happening with the gross Dew (Will Martin) poking his nose where he shouldn’t. The group trample over an abandoned hotel and one of their members Tom (Daniel Rashid) coming a cropper. As we reach the climax (in Tom’s case for the first time with his girlfriend Nikki (Michelle Veintimilla)) of the film, it becomes clear that there are sinister forces at work.

Strip away the tech and there’s little substance here (even allowing for one character’s harrowing childhood trauma that darkens the film) plot wise or visually. The budget was low so there’s few locations and effects are flashing coloured lights or those you can get with tik-tok and the like.

The direction by Jeff Ryan (co-written with Joe Adams) is breezy and the cast are very engaging. They are the usual stereotypes with nerd, disgusting and sexy all represented with some being more likeable that others, the main thing is that there’s an enthusiasm that gets them and the viewer through the film. Which is just as well as it does start to flag towards the end.

Mean Spirted will be available on digital from 7 February 2023.