THE STORY – A motivational speaker is tormented by an unrelenting itch on the back of her head.
THE CAST – Kelly Marie Tran, Miles Robbins, Toan Le & Kieu Chinh
THE TEAM – Shal Ngo (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 104 Minutes
Good news for folks who invested in Kelly Marie Tran stock after her breakthrough performance in “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” – 2025 is going to be a big year for her. She’s leading a film called “Forge” set to open at South by Southwest this week. She gives an incredible performance as the central character of the ensemble comedy-drama “The Wedding Banquet” (earning rave reviews after its premiere at Sundance), and she’s also the lead of the new Hulu horror film “Control Freak.” While it’s not the most polished or elevated material, Tran dives headfirst into the piece, fully committing to the body horror and ridiculous demonic antics asked of her. The film itself is mostly repetitive and, for anyone who has seen any of the numerous films that use horror as a metaphor for family trauma, pretty predictable, but Tran’s work as the undeniable star of the show is enough of a reason to make it worth watching. She’s onscreen for nearly the entire film and can find horrific variety in the uninspired material.
Tran plays Val, a self-made motivational speaker and lifestyle author who has built an empire around inspiring others to be their best selves (it’s not clear whether the brief glimpses we see of her speeches are meant to feel intentionally shallow or if that’s just a product of the screenwriting). As she explains to her adoring fans, just eight years prior, she was working a minimum-wage job and living in her car. Thanks to the power of (what appears to be) positive thinking and general hard work, she was able to get to where she is today, living in a huge house with a loving husband (Robbie, played by Miles Robbins) who’s eager to start a family with her. What she hasn’t shared with her fans is her disturbing family history: her mother died by drowning when she was very young, and her father (Toan Le) developed a drug addiction. He has since seemingly cleaned up his act and now lives as a devout life Buddhist monk. But still, Val seems to have it all together…except for a consistent habit of compulsively scratching the back of her head. She keeps itching herself with enough force that she eventually opens a wound, which worries Robbie. As Val deals with the stresses of an impending international speaking tour and the pressure of having a baby she doesn’t want, her scratching continues, and Val begins to suspect that something parasitic, or even supernatural, is hurting her.
So yes, this is yet another horror movie where a supernatural force is meant to stand in for the emotional and mental troubles a life-changing familial event creates. There’s also some too-brief expansion on this idea that manages to tie in cataclysmic man-made events, which is more impressive and unique than the family trauma aspect, but this notion gets far less time in the spotlight. The actual demon that represents the manifestation of these disturbances, as eventually revealed, is thankfully an original design…that is when we’re even able to see it. Of course, the film takes its time showing it, as all good suspenseful films should. But the moments that are meant to be revelations are quite literally hard to see. And although it’s visually inspired, the sound effects that bring it to life – along with its typically distorted voice spouting cliche dialogue – are about what one might expect from such an otherworldly figure. In fact, the parade of ants that creep around Val’s life before the demon shows up is more upsetting.
The most impressive scare moment doesn’t feature any creatures: one hallucination sequence involving a window on a rainy night that segues seamlessly into a body of water (it makes more sense in context) is particularly clever. The sound mix throughout the rest of the film also effectively places viewers inside Val’s paranoid head, using a nerve-tickling array of electronic and distorted sounds. In addition, the busy editing feels appropriately dizzying, and the cinematography is enhanced by the clever use of creatively placed shadows and lighting. The score by Jay Wadley and Landon Knoblock uses unnerving vocals and breathing sounds to help stoke the anxiety underneath the film.
Tran makes for a worthy lead, perfectly playing her character’s internal paranoia and external denial to others that anything is wrong. Val goes through a lot of the same types of trying situations with only moderate alterations between sequences, and Tran finds enough variance in her performance to keep these moments from feeling too repetitive (although they undeniably are). The film’s concluding scenes are where things kick into high gear, with her character forced to endure some fun nastiness that Tran totally sells. Although it’s a less flashy aspect of her performance, Tran has a very authoritative voice, which is good for making the audience buy her as a successful public speaker. “Control Freak” doesn’t break the mold of metaphor-based trauma-as-horror films, but Tran invests enough of her energy, talents, and impressive emotional ability into it to somewhat overcome some of the been-there-done-that nature of the screenplay.
