Screamfest Movie Review: LIKE.SHARE.FOLLOW (2017)

Welcome witches and warlocks,

Today I will be reviewing the horror/thriller LIKE.SHARE.FOLLOW by writer/director Glenn Gers. To best describe the story, I will use my own plot summary:

“A rising YouTube star finds his life turned upside down when he begins to believe his new girlfriend might be the same person as an overaggressive online fan.”

There is a very specific film that LIKE.SHARE.FOLLOW is referencing and those that can figure it out early will have a good idea of where the plot is heading. Like many movies in the new wave of digital horror, this one uses a lot of the common tropes of the genre, but sets them against a technological backdrop. Unlike some of the other pictures that have been using similar tactics, this piece actually takes some time to build the characters rather than relying upon a gimmick.

Honestly, the acting is where this feature really shines. The young cast has good instincts for their characters; crafting performances that feel genuine. The few adults in this feature are played by familiar actors who turn in performances that feel a bit world weary, but also completely sympathetic to the young stars. In fact, the acting was so good that it made some of the more outlandish plot movements easier to swallow.

What sort of out there moments do I mean? The fact that the stalker keeps getting the wrong impression is almost entirely on our main character who keeps leading her along even after suspecting she might be dangerous. Furthermore, near the finale our lead actor says he would be okay with unplugging from the internet, but keeps going back online with the help from his friend who realizes they are in dire straits. Now it is easy to write these off a bit because we are dealing with teenagers, but there is a moment when our main character’s father, after getting a personal taste of how badly things are escalating, still allows his son to handle things by himself rather than stepping in to help. This to me was the most ridiculous thing in the entire movie as I just could not believe a parent who clearly cared about his child would be okay letting their child deal with someone who was obviously deadly.

Luckily, there was a good bit of humor peppered throughout so that we were never lead to believe that this was supposed to be serious. Not only did the majority of the laughs work, they were pretty integral to the story as our lead made his living off of funny YouTube videos. Seeing his shorts in action was nice as they looked fairly authentic to what one would find while surfing the internet for humorous clips.

I was impressed with the overall production values on this movie. They were able to seamlessly transition between the bigger budget movie style look and the lower grade YouTube videos without ever making either feel overproduced. They backed up the look with a surprisingly tender score that served as a great conduit to some of the more dramatic sequences.

All in all, the story is familiar and occasionally unbelievable, but the cast makes this one entertaining. The look and score were much better than I had any reason to expect and truly helped back up the good performances. Fans of movies like Fatal Attraction (1987) and Unfriended (2015) will probably enjoy this flick.