Notable Cast: Nina Kiri, Adam DiMarco, Keana Bastidas,
Jeff Yung, Michele Duquet
As the genre of ‘liminal space horror’ starts to take the
world by storm, not just as an independent horror movement artistically, but
also powered most recently by the box office juggernaut of Backrooms,
it's necessary to remember that the concept is not new to the horror genre
overall. Empty spaces, lost items, and the hanging existential dread of the
terrors to come are all tactics horror has used since the beginning. It’s just
that so many modern filmmakers and storytellers are using it in a modern lens
that is both fascinating and certainly relevant to the time, and they’re doing
it with conviction. Example films like Skinamarink
or the earlier films of Osgood Perkins (check out I
Am the Pretty Thing that Lives in the House) laid a lot of the
groundwork for where we are in 2026, so it's not like this movement is even all
that new, comparatively speaking.
It’s this conviction and modern lens that make a film like Undertone
so diabolically effective. Director Ian Tuason is playing in the same space as
many other liminal horror films, but his intention is not only the physical
space in the film, but also the auditory space that often creates a sense of
dread and impending doom. As the saying goes, it's the things that are unspoken
or unheard that are often the most powerful. Undertone intends to
weaponize those and does an impeccable job at it while crafting a film that
makes sound the most important aspect, in all its choices.