When Obsession Becomes the Plot Itself
At its heart, Red Rooms (2023) directed by Pascal Plante, is a slow-burning psychological thriller that latches onto our darkest curiosities. We meet Kelly-Anne (played by Juliette Gariépy), a Montreal-based fashion model, who becomes obsessed with tracking the criminal trial of Ludovic Chevalier, an alleged dark web criminal who reportedly streamed horrific crime videos.
Every single day, she attends the trial, sitting in the gallery and observing from behind a pane of glass. We quickly figure out she is not an idle spectator. She (and her apartment, her poker winnings and poker hacking skills) is intermeshed with the criminal trial in a significant way. She is – considerably – not a spectator but is part of the attention-obsessed horror audience.
This fusion of audience and participant is what makes Red Rooms feel like reality. It captures our obsession with “true crime” and the endless cycle of clicking, streaming, and voyeuristically peering behind the curtain. We know the forbidden, yet we consistently rush in.
How It Snuck into Conversations
Even though Red Rooms is a French-language Canadian film, after premiering at festivals like Karlovy Vary and Fantasia, it started finding a few fans among the pre-genre audience. It’s become a film that is frequently being talked about among the morally complex storytelling seekers in the thriller community. It’s now become the film that is being talked about on online spine-tingling storytelling forums.
It’s now becoming a film that is being dissected, and for good reason. Many fans have even debated on the central character, Kelly-Anne’s, motives, and the existence of the “red room”, and whether it’s a metaphor for a room in her mind. Many fans of Pascal Plante have praised the film expressing the ‘violence’ in the atmosphere rather than the horror being graphically displayed. It has even received praise for the cold color palette, and ‘haunting’ the audience with composed ‘stillness’ and lack of emotional release.
It has received praise for the ambiance it creates that leaves the audience with psychological discomfort. It bears ‘no resemblance’ with jump scares that the horror films built on the ‘algorithm’ boast. It has even been compared to the work of David Fincher and ‘Black Mirror’. Ended with praise for being the reference film.
Kelly-Anne: Model, Gamer, Ghost in the Machine
Kelly-Anne is among the most fascinating characters in contemporary cinema. Yes, she is a model. However, she is also a poker player, a recluse, and a puzzle. The fixation with the Chevalier trial is the only thing anchoring her to reality. The spell she casts is just as much a product of her dispassion as her clinical accuracy, and her cold precision is a delight to watch. It is just as disturbing.
Juliette Gariépy’s performance is indeed commendable. It is also the case that, strictly speaking, she does not act. With eerie command, she seems to be inhabiting the character of Kelly-Anne. The way she remains
still and listens, as well as the spectatorial pose she seems to adopt, suggests a person behind glass walls of emtptiness so thick that even horror cannot penetrate.
Gariépy described preparing for the role by engaging with true crime communities and courtroom recordings. It reflects in her performance. The fascination with her character stems from the constant dispassionate gaze that seems always directed to the passive content readily available for consumption.
In a way, the extensive reach of Kelly-Anne’s attributes, including very posh and calm demeanor, is what made her a pop culture symbol. A certain online trend of ordering one’s appearance to match Kelly-Anne’s attributes emerged, featuring bold but minimal makeup, a ponytail, and a monochrome black outfit.
Fashion, Memes, and Digital Chill
Although Red Rooms did not perform exceptionally well in cinemas, its aesthetic influence permeated the culture. The minimalist chic of Kelly-Anne’s world started gaining popularity in fashion posts and TikTok edits, capturing the beauty of her cold digital poker screens, her monochrome wardrobe, and her polished yet impersonal apartment. Kelly-Anne was a source of inspiration.
On the internet, users created a variety of memes centered around her expressionless stares. Some screenshots were paired with captions like, “Me watching society collapse through my phone,” or, “POV: your empathy levels are buffering.” This was a subtle yet widespread meme phenomenon that was more ironic and admiring than expected.
In some contemporary and creative communities, Red Rooms was recognized for its design influence. Indie filmmakers cited its lighting and compositional symmetry as inspiration. Fashion bloggers discussed the “frozen luxury” aesthetic and how beauty, when stripped of warmth, feels oppressive.
Its unexpected use by social commentators in relation to digital voyeurism, and watching violence in the essays, was the most surprising. The film was a thriller, and not just a thriller—it was a reference point for the phenomenon of the internet transforming everyone into silent witnesses.
Voices Behind the Screen
Presenter and filmmaker Pascal Plante, a forner professional swimmer, instances he has always been drawn to obsession, why people become fixated on certain horrific content. Plante explained he wanted to understand the spectators mind rather than the killer’s.
In Montreal, the film was shot in Montreal on a tight schedule, leading to a suffocating, confined atmosphere. Vincent Biron, the cinematographer, pulled from the color palette of the artificial, cold illuminated light of screens, court fluorescents, and cameras, and for court focused the cold blues and grays. Each still frame has the beautiful quality of highly controlled and monitored surveillance footage and is deceptively entrusting.
Gariépy’s performance in the pivotal scene of the film demanded long emotional neutrality, while the chaos of the courtroom was taking place all around her. That single scene that reportedly consumed the hours of the day, took the mental endurance of several hours to perform, and on cue. Gariépy was entirely focused on her, the “control” in her performance to feel unnatural.
Laurie Babin, who portrayed Clementine, noted that the cast formed a connection during the intense psychological filming. They made a point to joke, stretch, or listen to music to break the eerie silence that the film incorprated. In an interview, Babin described it as “the quietest set I’ve ever been on… no one wanted to break the spell.”
The film that became a mirror
These days, one thing that makes Red Rooms resonate is how it reflects the current climate. It was released shortly after the public obsession with real-life trials being livestreamed, influencers dissecting the trials, and tragedy turned into a trend. In that sense, Kelly-Anne isn’t a villain or a hero, she’s us. Her urge to watch, know, and delve deep, regardless of the consequences, aligns with the public’s obsession with spectacle. The ‘red rooms’ of the title may stand for dark-web horrors, but they also signify the parts of our consciousness that we shouldn’t explore, yet do.
The work has generated discourse relating to a lack of a moral compass and desensitization of a human conscience. Can one really be untainted in a moral sense, when one is surrounded and interminably engaged with darkness? Is it even possible to be humane when one uses empathy/moral sentiment as a form of entertainment?
Even after several months of release, Red Rooms continues to be discussed in film podcasts and horror blogs. There are certain types of movies which do not end when the credits are shown. They stay, silently, and continue to alter a viewer’s perception of their own screen.
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