My quick rating – 4.8/10. Self-Help opens with the Bloody-Disgusting logo, which is usually a reassuring sign if you’re hoping for some mean-spirited carnage. Even better, it kicks off at a birthday party inside a ShowBiz Pizza Place, complete with the animatronic band that instantly unlocks some of my own fond kid party memories. For a brief moment, I thought I was getting a movie about to weaponize nostalgia and take us somewhere delightfully unhinged. Then that optimism takes a hard left turn when young Olivia catches her mother enjoying a very personal backroom moment with a clown. Childhood trauma – unlocked. Smash cut to college years, title card, and we’re off.
Now older, Olivia (Landry Bender) carries her emotional baggage openly, guarded and shaped by years of unresolved trauma. When she agrees to reconnect with her estranged mother, Rebecca (Amy Hargreaves), she ropes her friend Sophie (Madison Lintz) into tagging along to what turns out to be a self-actualization community that’s about three red flags deep within seconds. This is where we meet Curtis (Jake Weber), the group’s smooth-talking leader who runs his operation with an iron grip and a permanent aura of “something is very wrong here.” As the members reveal themselves, it becomes painfully clear that Olivia and Sophie have wandered into some weird-ass shit.
Despite the cult setup and a few bloody splashes here and there, this isn’t really a horror film. Despite the imagery, this is much more of a subdued thriller than anything that would qualify as a slasher film. It is always hanging on the edge of going with the dark and/or dangerous options, but it never quite follows through on this tease. Even the violence that happens is purely for effect and not at all cleansing.
The story’s twists are another weak point. Nothing here lands as a genuine surprise. Instead of “oh damn, didn’t see that coming,” most revelations are met with a shrug and a “yeah, that tracks.” Writer-director Erik Bloomquist also has a habit of underexplaining key developments, leaving certain motivations and turns feeling oddly incomplete. If you’ve seen it, you know exactly what that means.
The biggest problem, though, is pacing. The film drains its own energy before it really gets going. The early stretch is heavily focused on dysfunctional family drama, emotional wounds, and Olivia’s attempt to reconnect with a mother still under the influence of Curtis and his self-help society. Such aspects are significant, but they take over to such an extent in Self-Help that other aspects, such as the cult intrigue and mayhem, are relegated to the backseat. They seem to have already spent most of their runtime when the real action starts.
Self-Help isn’t awful, but it’s annoying. There’s a better, nastier movie buried in here, one that never quite scratches its way free. What’s left is a tame, oddly cautious thriller that had the potential to be much more disturbing than it ever lets itself be.
