By Elliott Robinson
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The horror genre may not be everyone's cup of tea in a world that feels more like an installment of The Purge franchise every day — but for those who find catharsis in replacing their real-life fears with fictional ones, a recent Canadian-French release might just fit the bill. Red Roomsis a high-stakes psychological thriller released with a nearly perfect score on Rotten Tomatoes — and it just became available to stream on Shudder.
At first glance, the plot of Red Rooms (translated from the original French, Les chambes rouges) seems evocative of an episode of Criminal Minds: there's court drama, a twisted serial killer, and even a whodunnit mystery to boot. At the heart of Red Rooms, however, is a woman whose fascination with the grotesque leads her to make more and more morally dubious choices, transforming her from the protagonist of the story to something a little more ambiguous. Kelly-Anne is a wealthy supermodel with a side hobby of computer coding and a passion for sitting in on criminal trials: namely, the court proceedings of alleged serial killer Ludovic Chevalier. As the trial unfolds, Kelly-Anne strikes up a friendship with one of Chevalier's passionate defendants, the mysterious and seemingly poverty-stricken Clementine.
The two women bond over their shared obsession with Chevalier's gruesome trial and ill-fated, but where Clementine manages to maintain a semblance of sanity, Kelly-Anne's own mental state quickly begins to crumble. The primary evidence in Chevalier's trial is a duo of snuff films, which document the gruesome end of two of his alleged victims, but the existence of a third victim — and thus the prospect of a third snuff film — sends Kelly-Anne on a virtual chase through the bowels of the Internet. But the closer she gets to solving this mystery, the higher the price for her obsession seems to become.
Directed by Pascal Plante, Red Rooms first premiered at the 57th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in July 2023, before earning a U.S. release in September 2024. The film is French-speaking with English subtitles, and stars Juliette Gariepy as Kelly-Anne, Laurie Babin as Clementine, and Maxwell McCabe Lokos as Ludovic Chevalier.
Red Rooms Speaks to a Growing Obsession With True Crime
Renowned for its stylish red overtones, panopticon imagery, and sophisticated storytelling, Red Rooms was an instant hit across North America. This success, however, can also be attributed to an emerging trend in the post-Internet world: an obsession with true crime and a tendency towards parasocial relationships. Kelly-Anne and Clementine are both brutally blunt demonstrations of these trends as their fixation begins to remove them further and further from reality, leading them to behave in harmful or even morally reprehensible ways. For example, Clementine ends up penniless and sleeping on the streets because of her desire to see Chevalier's criminal trial, while Kelly-Anne's fanaticism takes her even further into depravity when she turns up to a day of court proceedings dressed as one of Chevalier's victims.
Related
Red Rooms Review: A Gripping Warning About the Dangerous Allure of the Dark Web
The French-language stunner out of Montreal makes certain hard-hitting statements about the times we live in amongst dangerously modern technology.
This obsession with spectacle and fame is all too relevant today, where true-crime podcasts and television shows run amok while every aspect of someone's day can be viewed through a camera lens. Plante compares these behaviors to an addiction when taken to the extreme, and Kelly-Anne is undeniably a full-blown addict. When simply hearing about true-crime doesn't provide the rush that she needs, she finds herself becoming an active participant, whether that's solving a mystery at the heart of a criminal trial or engaging in other, even more detrimental behaviors. Although this isn't a trajectory that encompasses all true-crime fans, it's certainly a warning for those who find themselves overly obsessed with consuming tragedy and spectacle.

4 /5
Red Rooms
R
Thriller
Crime
Drama
Kelly-Anne is obsessed with the high-profile case of a serial killer, and reality blurs with her morbid fantasies. She goes down a dark path to get the missing video of the murder of a young girl, to whom Kelly-Anne bears a disturbing resemblance.
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*Availability in US
- Release Date
- September 6, 2024
- Director
- Pascal Plante
- Cast
- Juliette Gariépy, Laurie Babin, Elisabeth Locas, Maxwell McCabe-Lokos, Natalie Tannous, Pierre Chagnon, Guy Thauvette, Myriam Baillargeon