POV: Going to watch the new movie Barbarian

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Tess, the main character, featured in this poster.

Disturbing and unsettling. Two words I would use to describe Barbarian. Barbarian is a movie that revolves around the main character, Tess, and her experience in a new state. Tess moves to the bad side of the town and everything starts to unravel after she arrives at the airbnb. Whenever the movie was going viral on the Tik Tok app, I saw the movie advertisement and knew I had to watch it. Not watching the trailer before watching the movie was my first mistake. Watching the movie was the other.

I arrived at the movie theater to have the full experience of the movie and get the most out of it. The obvious objective was to get scared, and these standards weren’t met. Other than the occasional jump scares, this movie was not scary. The antagonist buildup wasn’t established, so the initial appearance was very unusual and considered the scariest part. This particular scene was the typical dark hallway scene that would cause viewers to get scared and jump out of their seats.

Regarding the plot, it was incredibly disappointing. The main character had realistic precautions but never acted on them. Internally screaming at Tess was another factor that ruined the movie for me. Bill Skarsgard played Keith, the mysterious and interesting character. This man stayed at the airbnb as well and his behavior was very odd, making him obviously suspicious. The antagonist is never the obvious one. It was challenging for me to focus on the main objective because information was being thrown at me from every angle. The flow of the movie kept being interrupted by random points of views of other characters which added to the confusion.

Dazed and confused, I decided to continue watching the movie. The antagonist’s background was finally shown but in a cryptic way. Viewers were supposed to connect the dots and form a conclusion about how a human transformed into the thing we saw on the screen. The mystery still dwells in my mind. The theme of twisted motherhood that stemmed from male violence made the whole film uncomfortable to watch.

The use of symbols and motifs was fascinating to watch and would be great to explore if I were to thoroughly analyze this film. Analyzing this movie would be easier rather than enjoying it. As a horror movie enthusiast, I do not recommend this movie. If you decide to watch it, don’t say I didn’t warn you.