By George & Josh Bate
“A new kind of love story from the creators of Barbarian.” That’s the tagline on the poster for Companion, a new horror movie from writer/director Drew Hancock in his directorial debut. Other promotional material says that the film is “from the studio that brought you The Notebook, and the creators of Barbarian.” What better way to sell a movie than tease a genre-blending horror story helming from the creative minds behind one of the best horror movies in the last decade? As a result, Companion has skyrocketed to the top of many moviegoers’ most anticipated lists and gives this January, a month typically reserved for less-than-spectacular fare at the movies, a chance to shine more brightly than usual. Ultimately, however, the impressively effective tagline for Companion oversells a movie that, while clever and engaging, falters in its execution.
It’s impossible to fully review Companion without discussing its big twist, but Companion is a film best enjoyed if its big twist remains under wraps prior to viewing. Unfortunately, trailers (essentially) spoil this twist and, in turn, give away one of the film’s greatest selling points. In order to preserve the twist as best as we can then, this review will begin by breaking down our entirely spoiler-free thoughts on the movie, before transitioning into ‘light’ spoiler territory in which the twist (which, again, is revealed in trailers) is discussed.
Very generally speaking, Companion follows Iris (played by Yellowjackets’ Sophie Thatcher) and Josh (played by The Boys’ Jack Quaid), a couple who gather with a group of friends at a billionaire’s remote cabin for a weekend of good food, good drinks, and good company. The weekend initially goes swimmingly – that is, until a sudden and violent event disrupts everything.
Companion has all the ingredients of a groundbreaking, pop culture phenomenon of a horror movie, which makes it all the more disheartening to eventually realize that the final film is best characterized as serviceable and entertaining than anything close to groundbreaking. The beginning of the film shows Sophie Thatcher’s Iris and Jack Quaid’s Josh meet for the first time in a grocery store. Like a scene straight out of a corny romantic comedy, Josh fumbles his introduction to Iris, accidentally knocking over a tray of oranges before the two laugh together and fall in love immediately. A voiceover from Iris, however, teases something more sinister is to come. Thatcher’s character explains that this feeling of joy and warmth was something she has experienced twice in her life – the first day she met Josh and…the day she killed him. Cut to the opening credits and Companion will have you hooked. In just a few moments, the film already introduces two seemingly likable leads, teases a blend of genres that The Notebook and Barbarian crossover of the promotional material suggested, and poses an intriguing and ominous question for the audience to ponder over.
The momentum continues into the film’s first act as Thatcher’s Iris and Quaid’s Josh arrive at the remote luxury cabin of Sergey, a Russian billionaire played brilliantly over-the-top by the consistently incredible Rupert Friend. Also at the cabin are three friends of Josh’s played by Megan Suri (Never Have I Ever), Lukas Gage (The White Lotus), and Harvey Guillén (What We Do in the Shadows), all of whom get along splendidly and are ready to a fun weekend getaway. The black sheep of the group is Iris, who questions whether Josh’s friends really like her and struggles with anxiety and insecurity. There’s very much a feeling of Bodies Bodies Bodies in this introduction, from the jovial dynamic of the friend group to the remote getaway to the leading woman feeling alienated from the others. Unlike Bodies Bodies Bodies though, the audience has already been explicitly told by this early point in the film that something bad is going to happen, which makes these early scenes harbor an unsettling tone seeping through everything.
When the aforementioned big twist happens, Companion changes direction entirely. Without giving away what the twist entails (yet), we can comment on the execution of this twist, which, for the most part, is done quite well. Having not seen the trailers prior to watching the film, we found the twist to be entirely unexpected and that it created a sense of excitement and intrigue as to what’s to come. If there’s anything to fault with the execution of the twist though, it’s that it comes a tad too early in the proceedings. Movies with similar narrative-altering twists like Barbarian excel largely due to a tense and suspenseful build-up to the twist, a purposeful and calculated delay in telling the audience what the film is really about. Writer/director Hancock proves to be a little too eager in this regard as more time on the front end building up to the twist would have heightened the anxiety and terror in a ‘horror’ movie that unfortunately largely lacks both of these qualities.
Discrepancies in the quality of ideas and execution of these ideas dominate the remaining film. Companion doesn’t do anything particularly poorly, although just about everything falls short of truly commendable. The film features an abundance of suspense, despite never hitting immersive or palpable levels of intensity. There are a number of other twists and turns throughout the film, all of which are cleverly conceived yet lack the filmmaking punch to make them feel like real game-changers to the story. Speaking of cleverly, the word ‘clever’ aptly characterizes a number of moments in the film, which take creative advantage of the entailments afforded by the big twist.
All the while Sophie Thatcher commands the screen and continues to prove that she is a real star in the making. Following impressive turns in Heretic and Yellowjackets, Thatcher showcases incredible range and emotional intelligence here in playing a demanding role with groundedness, vulnerability, and a dark sense of humor.
Jack Quaid, meanwhile, is the film’s second lead and delivers something quite unexpected with his performance. For much of the runtime, Quaid doesn’t exactly steal scenes or do anything particularly different from his performances in Scream or The Boys. However, as the film progresses and his character evolves, Quaid showcases a previously unseen dimension of his acting repertoire, one that deftly blends menace with humor and subtlety with ostentatiousness.
Also deserving plaudits for his role in the film is Rupert Friend. Playing the billionaire Sergey with an outlandishness at odds with the performances of his castmates, Friend somehow manages to make his character fit in so well. The over-the-top Russian accent and hilarious moustache and mullet combo make for a humorous outward appearance that conceals the character’s darker traits, and leaves a lasting impression on the audience, even if Friend’s screen time is rather limited.
The next three paragraphs of the review will reveal some spoilers for Companion. To reiterate, these are plot elements that are revealed in the film’s trailers and promotional material and that occur fairly early on in the film, but, nonetheless, readers may wish to go into Companion knowing as little as possible. For those who fall into this camp, skip over the next three paragraphs and continue reading with the Verdict.
The big twist we’ve been referring to is that Sophie Thatcher’s character Iris is a robot. More specifically, she is a companion robot purchased and ‘owned’ by Quaid’s character to be his girlfriend. As stated previously, this reveal comes as a genuine surprise if one is lucky enough to avoid promotional material ahead of time. A few odd hints in isolation, such as Megan Suri’s character Kat disliking “the idea of Iris” rather than Iris itself and the driverless car Josh and Iris use indicating the existence of futuristic technology, do little to rouse suspicion, while providing some important context in retrospect. There is another layer to this twist, which is revealed shortly after, that we also didn’t see coming, despite the writing clearly being on the wall when thinking back to previous events. Together, these dual twists change the entire landscape of Companion and inject the film with the sort of gargantuan story-altering shifts we love to see in movies like Barbarian or the 1982 thriller Deathtrap.
Whereas those films continue to surprise and grip throughout, Companion plays out in engaging, albeit mundane, fashion. The reveal to both the audience and Iris herself that Iris is a robot turns Companion movie into a survival chase movie of sorts, with Josh and his friends hunting Iris down and Iris trying to survive after a violent event occurs at the remote cabin. For a while, the film surprisingly lacks energy and suspense, although clever plot shifts see it eventually gain some momentum.
Where Companion most stands out and what will likely define its lasting impression on most viewers is its exploration of themes at the intersection of AI and intimate relationships. Everyone has seen that article title from The Sun, which spawned a viral tweet and meme, about women having more sex with robots than men by 2025, and Companion very much plays with the ethical implications of such a future. One of the film’s most cognitively horrifying moments, and one of the few moments that make Companion really feel like a horror movie, comes when Iris initially discovers she is a robot, having previously thought she was a human like everyone else. This opens the door to all sorts of fascinating ethical questions about consent that feel particularly relevant today and about the rights of artificial beings that may be particularly relevant someday soon. The relationship between Iris and Josh at the heart of the film is also one that exposes the horror of intimate partnership and puts new meaning into the phrase ‘being used’ by another. Writer/director Hancock does well to not make any of these messages too overt, while also depicting them in an easily digestible and interpretable manner for the audience. A testament to the strong writing and interesting ideas explored here, Companion leaves one pondering existential questions of autonomy and intimate questions of consent in ways few movies do and, in turn, greatly aids in overlooking the mundanity of parts of the film.
VERDICT: 6.5/10
Billed as a new kind of love story from the creators of Barbarian, Companion may fall short of the genre-blending groundbreaker it was teased to be, although clever ideas and thematically rich storytelling elevate the film beyond it being a standard horror flick. A strong yet short-lived build-up to a big early twist (which, ideally, should remain unknown to audiences prior to viewing) entirely changes the landscape of writer/director Drew Hancock’s directorial debut in a genuinely unexpected manner. The proceeding film stumbles, however, with consistent discrepancies between the story beats it features and its execution of these story beats, resulting in a movie more engaging than it is gripping. Despite this, the lasting impact of Companion will be tied to the ethical questions it poses as a result of the big twist, which are fascinatingly explored and have great contemporary relevance. A stellar lead performance from Sophie Thatcher, meanwhile, showcases the young actress’ star power, while Jack Quaid produces a surprising performance unlike anything seen from him before. In the end, Companion may fall victim to its promotional campaign (both in the unfortunate reveal of its big twist and the expectations established by associating it with a movie of the quality of Barbarian). Nonetheless, Companion proves to be a well-constructed thriller with an early seismic shift in the narrative, strong performances, clever ideas, and relevant themes, all of which make it easier to overlook some of the film’s unfortunate mundanity.