My quick rating – 4.1/10. Hey, look, another one from Full Moon. It’s kind of like a mediocre new Twilight Zone episode, only with more porn references and an evil AI. Directed by the legendary Charles Band, Aimee: The Visitor follows Scott Keyes (Dallas Schaefer), a genius hacker who doesn’t seem to have much use for humanity. His world revolves around computers and pornography until he and his partners Hunter (Felix Merback) and Gazelle (Faith West) crack a code that leads them to AIMEE, an advanced AI program.
What starts as curiosity quickly turns into obsession as Scott falls under AIMEE’s seductive spell. She’s not exactly Alexa with an attitude either. AIMEE is manipulative, dangerous, and apparently has plans that involve considerably more than helping Scott organize his browser history.
The AI angle is easily the most interesting part of the movie. AIMEE isn’t just some mindless computer program waiting to be unplugged. She’s intelligent enough to manipulate the people around her, and there are some decent ideas here about technology, human desires, and what happens when you create something you don’t fully understand. Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t push those ideas nearly as far as I wanted it to.
Scott starts out as a pretty unlikeable character but becomes more interesting as he gets deeper into AIMEE’s world. Schaefer did a pretty good job with him. On the other hand, Gazelle was somewhat difficult to take seriously. Whenever she started dropping F-bombs, I felt that her character was miscast. Considering West was probably the best actor in the movie, I can blame the role for that.
Of course, this is Full Moon, so there’s nudity. Lots of porn references too. Interestingly enough, I found myself laughing at the jokes made about the porn much more than at the nakedness itself. The thing is, most of the gags just make a reference to sex without any sexual scenes shown, and some of them were quite amusing. The nudity was sometimes distracting and unnecessary.
The movie also barely qualifies as horror. The idea of AIMEE becoming a murderer and potentially having plans beyond these three people is creepy enough, and I kept hoping she’d eventually lose control and slaughter everyone. Sadly, the movie loses track of that fun as it goes along and eventually wraps up with a disappointing ending.
At only 69 minutes, it never overstays its welcome, which is probably its biggest strength. I just wish there had been more story to go with the premise. Maybe it was a budget issue. Maybe they simply ran out of ideas. But it felt like the movie ended just when I was starting to enjoy it more than I probably should have.
I’m sure the fanboy part of me that has been watching Full Moon flicks since the VHS days helped here. There’s enough weirdness, humor, and low-budget Full Moon charm to make Aimee: The Visitor worth a look for fans of the studio. Just don’t expect the killer-AI movie it occasionally threatens to become.
