*spoilers for the movie Obsession, as well as mentions of abuse*
When one of the highest-grossing films of the summer isn’t a franchise movie like Star Wars or a Marvel movie, people take notice. When said film is also a horror movie, that piques even more interest. And when the film is an indie horror movie that was made with a budget of no more than $750,000 and makes over $400 million worldwide, everyone is tuned in. This was the case for Curry Barker’s Obsession, which came out in May 2026 and quickly earned critical acclaim and a cult following. Obsession follows a man named Bear (the protagonist, not the hero) who makes a wish that his friend, Nikki, would love him more than anything in the world, which comes true but with devastating results. I personally saw Obsession three times in theaters and was captivated. It was a phenomenal movie, with great acting and an amazing script, but what had me hooked was the fact that this is the first horror movie in a long time that truly and deeply scared me. Why did Obsession rattle me so badly? Because what happens to Nikki is something that could truly happen in real life.
At its core, Obsession is a film about control and loss of autonomy. When Bear makes his wish on a “One Wish Willow” for Nikki to love him more than anyone in the whole world, the result is that Nikki no longer has her own autonomy, and is forced to love and be with Bear to her extreme detriment. Nikki is only freed from the “One Wish Willow”’s curse when Bear dies, but by then her life has been ruined beyond repair. Nikki’s story was haunting to the majority of viewers, particularly female viewers, because the film builds on a very realistic fear for most women: being trapped in an abusive romantic relationship. Many women related to Nikki’s story of being trapped, had their own stories of dating someone like Bear, or knew men who acted similarly to how Bear did in the film. The scary part of the movie wasn’t that that there was a supernatural element — it was the fact that the supernatural element was used to take away Nikki’s autonomy for someone else’s romantic pursuits. If you take away the “One Wish Willow,” Nikki’s story is one that most, if not all, women are familiar with.
Obsession is not the only movie that builds on the idea of control and abusive relationships. Movies like Companion, Blink Twice, Last Night in Soho, and Heretic all revolve around the idea of control, specifically control of women. In these movies, women find themselves in relationships or situations that are dangerous and deadly, and the movie follows them fighting their way out. The horror from these doesn’t come solely from graphic kills or bloodshed (even though they all have some gnarly kills) but from taking a realistic fear and amplifying it. I’ve talked about it before, but Blink Twice rattled me so badly that I will not watch it ever again.
While movies with masked killers like Scream and Friday the 13th are scary, the odds of running into someone in a Halloween mask on a murder spree are low. You can watch the movie, and then turn it off knowing that it probably won’t happen to you. But movies like Obsession, where the horror comes from a real fear that most, if not all women have? That’s scarier than any masked killer could ever be.