Did A24 Actually Pull Off Backrooms? (Spoiler-Free Review)

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]I finally got to see the new A24 horror movie Backrooms. This movie, this thing had so much hype surrounding it, right?

[00:00:06]20-year-old director Kane Parsons bringing his YouTube series to life on the big screen. Did he deliver? Did he pull off the impossible? Let's talk about it. So, Backrooms is about this guy named Clark who stumbles into this different reality that kind of mirrors our own reality and he's stuck there and his therapist Mary has to go save him.

[00:00:23]Now, there is a lot more to the story, but at the same time not really. And that's totally fine because the whole point of this movie is the Backrooms. What's in there? What's it about? What's around every corner?

[00:00:33]So, the plot is just to get us in there.

[00:00:35]Once we're in there and once the action gets rolling, then it's a lot of fun.

[00:00:38]So, Chiwetel Ejiofor plays the main character in this movie named Clark and I'm going to tell you right now I could care less about Clark. I don't care what his story was, his background. [music] I just did not care. But, what I did care about is every single scene that he was in, he acted his ass off. I mean, this guy has a resume, right? 12 Years a Slave is probably his biggest movie, which is a phenomenal movie and every single movie that he's in, he delivers.

[00:01:00]This is just another fantastic, you know, thing to throw on his resume. And in a horror movie that's just kind of bare-bones, there's not really much for him to do necessarily and really flesh out his character. Every single scene that he's in, he's acting like he's trying to win an award. And Rene Russo plays Mary, the therapist, who goes in the Backrooms to actually save Clark.

[00:01:17]She is also very good. She has a little bit less to do in this movie and it doesn't really follow her as much, but she still does a great job, right? The movie follows both of them. They take up most of the screen time. They both do a fantastic job. [music] And Mark Duplass is actually in the movie, but he doesn't really have a lot of screen time. He's not really given much to do. It's always great seeing him on screen. I think he's great. He's a great actor. I just wish he had a little bit more to do in this movie. So, what does this movie do? What does Kane Parsons do? This 20-year-old first-time director do to really stand out in the world of cinema and give us a little bit of a different take on the horror genre. The concept itself is already crazy, but what does he do specifically to make this thing kind of stick with you? So, he does a little bit of a mix here, right? He did the Backrooms series on YouTube, all found footage. He does that a lot in this movie, and it's one of the best parts about this movie. Every scene that's like handheld camera, found footage, phenomenal. The sound is great. The The The look of it's all gritty. It just It really makes you feel uncomfortable even though everything that you're looking at doesn't [music] make sense. The added grain to the film and the sound just adds so much to the experience. But, then the other thing that he does is he does this this camera angle on a lot of the characters in a lot of the scenes to really add to that. He adds a lot of uncomfortable positions and just he how he frames everything just adds so much to the experience. It's nothing crazy, but he has the camera a little bit lower than eye level with the characters. So, you see them in a in a position that makes them feel vulnerable. Well, I guess I should say even more vulnerable than they are in the Backrooms. Everything that he does here with the camera work just adds so much more. And I really do appreciate his use of restraint. There are some weird weird images, creepy, scary images in this movie, but it's used very sparingly, and for the most part, not a lot's going on. The Backrooms all look the same. Every corner kind of looks the same. Just weird things going on here and there, but nothing that really stands out. So, when things do pop out, they stick out like a sore thumb. And another small detail that I really did appreciate in this movie is the setting.

[00:03:19]The setting's set in like the early '90s, and just everything about that time period somehow adds more dread or, you know, just more atmosphere to this movie. I can't explain it. You just have to see it, and you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. And as far as how scary this movie is, as far as the jump scares and everything that makes a scary movie scary, I think that the one thing that I can tell you that this movie excels at above everything else is the atmosphere, right? I wasn't scared at any certain point where I was, you know, really terrified by anything that I saw or, you know, a jump scare that popped out.

[00:03:53]There are jump scares, but nothing really affected me too much. What I did notice is that multiple times, especially in the found footage handheld camera moments, [music] my heart was racing. I was getting a little creeped out by, you know, what was going on. I didn't know what was going to be around the next corner. And then in certain scenes, the use of [music] sound, the use of what's going on, and the the the sound of their voices coming through the camera kind of mu- muffled, like there's just so much going into the atmosphere to really just freak you out, and that's what it did to me, and I think that's what this movie does so well. Now, I'm really curious on people that have watched the YouTube series and people that haven't and how they're going to come together and have discussions on this movie because I haven't seen a full episode of that. I knew very, very little, virtually nothing going into this movie. I knew how it looked as far as those videos go, but that's really about it. I knew nothing going into this. I was confused as hell at the end of it. Talking to my buddies afterwards, I kind of started to form, [music] you know, uh a concept of what was actually happening, what the end meant, all that stuff. So, I really want to go back and rewatch the actual series now. But if you've seen the series or you haven't seen the series and you're like me and just jumped right in, let me know what you thought about that in the comments because I am so curious how you interpret what what actually happened and if you even liked it. So, my final thoughts on Backrooms is I think this is a great directorial debut from Kane Parsons. I think he took all of the strengths that he gained from doing the web series and he cranked it up to 10.

[00:05:18]And he also tried a few new things here that for the most part really worked. I do think that the story, the plot, the the characters kind of bogged the movie down a little bit, which is going to be a negative, right?

[00:05:29]But at the end of the day, who cares? Do you want to jump into the Backrooms and see what the heck this is and all the creepy stuff that's in it.

[00:05:37]So, they delivered on that part. But once again, let me know in the comments if this is your first time being exposed to the Backrooms lore or if you watched the web series, let me know your takes on this movie specifically down in the comments. Thanks for watching my review and I'm going to catch you in the next video.