‘Touch Me’ Review: A Wacky Horror Film That Never Fully Realizes Its Satirical Ambition
“Touch Me” starts intriguingly with a long scene set in a therapist’s office. Joey (Olivia Taylor Dudley), who suffers from OCD and childhood trauma, recounts how she met a sexy alien from another planet and describes the hot affair she had with him. According to her story, not only was the sex good, but his touch immediately cured all her anxieties. “Touch Me” goes on to show how this otherworldly character blows up Joey’s world. Regrettably, what writer-director Addison Heiman visually reveals of this creature and his world never matches up with what Taylor Dudley’s haunting delivery suggests of her character’s experience.
Joey is a drifter working odd jobs and hardly making ends meet. She hasn’t been able to garner opportunities for her creative endeavors. She lives with her trust-fund gay friend Craig (Jordan Gavaris). When his house becomes uninhabitable due to a plumbing problem that makes it reek of excrement (yes, it’s that kind of movie), they have no recourse but to move in with Joey’s alien. He’s adopted the name Brian for his human form (represented by Lou Taylor Pucci) and lives with a middle-aged assistant, Laura (Marlene Forte), who insists she’s human even though her behavior is stranger than Brian’s.
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Soon after, these four characters are involved in a codependent quadruple of shifting alliances and jealous desires. Craig aslo suffers from anxiety and seeks Brian’s healing touch, putting him at odds with his best friend. Laura is envious of Joey’s chemistry with Brian, whom she wants for herself. Brian plays the other three for nefarious ends that are not immediately revealed. All of this leads to mayhem, involving sex, murder and lots of gushing blood — appropriate for a film premiering in Sundance’s Midnight section.
These characters are wacky and slightly off-putting, which should keep audiences interested for a while. Brian likes to wear tracksuits and dance. Laura struts around with eyes only for the alien while trying to keep the other two from getting close to him. Joey and Craig are so enthralled with Brian and afraid of Laura that they forget they’re friends and could be allies. Heiman withholds how this alien could have sex with humans for a time, but once it’s revealed, it’s more of a joke than a surprise.
The film starts as a riff on codependent relationships and a narcissistic man-child who nevertheless gets everyone around him to do his bidding, but as the plot swerves in one direction after the other, the satire gets lost. Heiman uses many things — split screens, dreamlike fantastical sequences and lots of blood and severed limbs — to keep the proceedings interesting, largely to no avail. The plot gets too convoluted, and a later coda acknowledging that nothing makes sense and shouldn’t be taken seriously comes across like lazy writing, as if the filmmakers couldn’t make sense of what they wrote and decided to move ahead anyway, raher than taking another pass.
Taylor Dudley has a quiet grounding presence in direct contrast to the mayhem surrounding her character, which makes her intriguing to watch. With constantly startled facial expressions and peculiar movements, whether walking or dancing, Pucci makes for a believable parasite from another realm. Gavaris is recognizable as a sullen spoiled brat, but his character’s trauma is never afforded much depth. Forte, best in show, keeps the audience guessing as to her character’s motivations and never settles for playing a facile villain.
‘Touch Me ‘ proves that Heimann has an unusual point of view and lots on her mind. The film references so many things that are ailing people nowadays, from climate disaster to childhood trauma to economic hardships for creatives. She knows how to keep audiences intrigued with small doses of visual flair and odd characters. Yet, in the end, “Touch Me” is neither a fully realized satire nor a classically gory horror movie. In trying to do too much, the filmmakers end up with much less than they could have.
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