Main cast: Aisha Dee (Cecilia), Hannah Barlow (Emma), Emily De Margheriti (Alex), Daniel Monks (Jamie), Yerin Ha (Tracey), Lucy Barrett (Fran), Shaun Martindale (Constable Martindale), April Blasdall (Young Alex), Camille Cumpston (Young Emma), and Amelia Lule (Young Cecilia)
Directors: Hannah Barlow and Kane Senes
Sissy is the childhood nickname for the young lady that has blossomed into Sincerely Cecilia, an influencer with over 250,000 followers.
She now focuses on meditation, mindfulness, and all that jazz, but her own serenity is challenged when a chance encounter with her childhood BFF Emma has Emma inviting her to Emma’s bachelorette party—here’s to having fun in some remote place in the woods, yay.
Well, it’s not so yay because Cecilia realizes that one of the guests is Emma’s good friend Alex… who also happens to be a bully that targeted Cecilia a lot back in those days.
You know how it is with these reunions, I’m sure. Alex and Cecilia soon revert to their childhood selves, with Alex getting all passive aggressive in antagonizing Cecilia.
Naturally, the others say casually that Cecilia should just let the past be and make nice with Alex. However, Alex seems intent on pushing all of Cecilia’s buttons.
Mind you, Cecilia is no saint here. Alex has a reason, rational or not, to hold on to a grudge, let’s just say.
However, this is a slasher flick, not some psychological drama, so eventually Alex succeeds too well in hitting Cecilia where it hurts the most: trying to ruin Cecilia’s public image to her followers. They do say to be careful of what one wishes for, as Cecilia is now goaded beyond reason and the body count starts to pile up…
This movie is quite sneaky. The first half or so is presented in a manner that makes one sympathize with Cecilia, with the others coming off as mean bullies. Aisha Dee puts on a good show here, as her character starts out as very likable and relatable despite the social media buzzwords and jargon that Cecilia keeps spouting.
It is once Cecilia snaps that it is more evident that there is something just off about her. She’s very desperate to be liked to a very unhealthy degree, and her influencer façade is obviously a false front. She clings to a childhood memory of a perfect friendship with Emma, one that is soon revealed to be more of her fantasy than reality, and having transferred her pathological need to be liked and popular to her new “friends” that follow her on social media, she will do just about anything to preserve her social media clout.
Still, as interesting as the character dynamics of Alex, Emma, and Cecilia could be, it’s tad disappointing to have the show eventually dumbs down all three women into just being three screechy psychos. The kills aren’t that remarkable, as they are meant to be more comical and ironic than gore hound-friendly, so it feels like the movie has sacrificed much of its depths for something more shallow and mundane.
Oh, and the ending can be seen coming from a mile away.
So yes, this one could have been smart, funny, and biting had it kept to its original course of dark and morbid comedy, but for some reasons it veers off course to become another typical slasher film heavy in too-obvious “irony” and “satire” like we are all in 1996 again and every movie wants to be Scream.
I can’t help feeling that Aisha Dee deserves better than this!
