Hello Everyone, Welcome to my channel.
Today I am going to recap and explain a recently released Shudder original horror film called
Slapface.
The film starts with two brothers named Tom and Lucas.
They were playing a game named slap face where they used to slap each other.
They were playing it mainly to forget their emotional pain and past.
It may sound weird but slap facing is actually a professional sport.
Mostly played in central Asia.
Three years ago Lucas and Tom lost their parents in a car accident.
This traumatized both of them.
To forget that they used to self-harm each other.
Tom was not ready to take up the responsibility of his younger brother.
In frustration and loneliness, he got addicted to drinks.
Tom and Lucas's house was on the outskirts of the city and it was near to the Woods.
The house was in a mess and it reflected the mental state of Tom.
Locus used to roam around these woods.
One day we see Lucas searching about the folklore of this town.
It's called Virago.
I must admit here, the first time I saw this I read it as Viagra.
LOL.
According to the folklore, at the abandoned mansion of the town, there lived a witch called
Virago.
She used to possess kids and make them commit heinous crimes.
A nursery rhyme-like sentence says of her, “Then she was a breeze, then she was a beast,
killing the parents of the little boy.”
We see a few articles about her in the newspaper.
One headline quotes a child saying the witch made him do it.
Next, we see Lucas standing in front of that mansion.
He takes out his mom's photo and buries it there with his blood.
I guess he might have read some sort of ritual online.
Clearly, he was missing her.
The same night Tom flirts with a girl called Anna.
Just then towns Sharif arrived there and informed Tom about Lucas's suspicious activities.
Officer sympathizer with Tom how he was doing his best to raise his little brother, but
he was not satisfied.
He was a good friend of their mom hence he insisted he take good care of his little brother.
We warned him that Lucas is going out of hand.
Tom didn't know how to deal with this situation.
Hence he and Lucas again started playing the slap face game.
This was Tom's way of punishing Lucas and making him understand what he has done.
This time Anna was in Tom's room and she saw everything.
For her, this seems odd and weird.
Tom described the slap face as a game to “clear the shit away”.
Meaning something to numb the pain, to help them forget about their parent's death, just
like drinking.
The next day we see Lucas running in the woods where three girls were chasing him.
They were actually bullying him.
Lucas had no friends he wanted to be friends with these girls but these girls were not
interested.
Accept Moriah.
She was romantically attracted towards Lucas but was hesitant to say it out loud to her
twin friends.
The girls gave a dare to Lucas to be their friends.
They asked him to enter that haunted mansion and bring any gift from there.
Locus agreed, he was not scared of that mansion as he never believed in any of that folklore.
He entered the mansion.
In one of the rooms, there were lots of booze and trashes.
Lucas picked up a small metal statue that was shining.
As soon as he picked it up a black witch appeared behind him.
Lukas saw it in a mirror, he started screaming.
This scared the hell out of girls and they quickly ran from there.
The witch grabbed Lucas and started shaking him.
Next, we see Lucas outside the mansion where Moriah was beside him.
She says sorry to him, it seemed she was totally into him.
But she was still hesitant to accept him publically so she asked him to keep their thing a secret.
Tom was happy with his girlfriend Anna and he was teaching her how to shoot a gun.
He had a fully loaded gun in his house which belonged to his dad.
During dinner, Anna saw a mark on Lucas's hand.
She asked him what happened.
Lucas tried to explain to her about the witch but Tom interrupted him.
Tom started flirting with Anna.
He was more interested in the after-dinner activity than in his little kid.
The next day out of curiosity Lucas again went near that mansion.
This time the which just appeared in front of him out of nowhere and started shaking
him thoroughly.
Lucas again started screaming for help but there was no one.
After a few minutes, the witch stopped him and started staring at him.
It seemed she was not harming him, she just needed a friend.
Lucus was also alone, he had no friends hence he accepted this unusual friendship.
For many days he visited that mansion.
Anna started living with Tom, she noticed Lucas's weird behavior.
She told Tom about this but Tom as usual ignored it.
One day while coming back from the mansion a dog started chasing Lucas.
He was horrified, he started running from there.
Just then the witch appeared in front of him and killed that dog.
Later both of them buried that dog together.
The dog's blood was all over Lucas's body.
When Anna saw Lucas washing his hands she knew something is not right.
He was hiding something.
Anna and Tom fight over this issue and Anna left the house abruptly.
That night the witch appeared in front of Lucas's house and for some weird reason, she
scratched Anna's car.
The next day Moriah visits Lucas.
This time Lucas explains everything to her he even took her to that mansion.
But Moriah was hesitant and scared to go inside hence the came back.
The witch observed this by hiding behind a tree.
Anna was driving when she saw a poster of a missing dog.
She thought Lucus might be connected to this.
The witch now arrived at Lucas's house and started observing it.
At the same time, Anna also arrives.
She finds items of dark magic-related objects in Lucas's room.
Her suspicion groove even further.
Just then she heard the noise.
She got scared, she took Tom's gun and came out of the room.
There was the witch standing in front of her.
As soon as she saw her, she started shooting at her.
The witch attacked her.
In the evening when Lucas was home he gets a call from a bar attender.
Tom was again wasted with drinks.
He and Aana were supposed to pick him up but Aana was nowhere to be seen.
Lucus saw a bullet mark on the wall, he got scared.
He thought this may be the job of the witch.
Anyway, he picked Tom from the bar.
The next morning when Tom woke up, he too saw that bullet Mark.
He got tense asked Lucas about this.
He was not sure whether Lucas did anything wrong to Anna or not.
Tom searched anna everywhere but she was missing.
He got really frustrated and started drinking heavily again.
This guy sadly knew only one solution to all his problems.
Drinking.
At night Moriah and Lucas were talking and playing snap face when they heard Tom's screaming
voice.
A big rat had invaded their house and Tom was chasing it.
Lucas saw that and he brutally killed that rat.
Moriah got scared seeing that kind of rage in Lucas.
She was convinced that this is not the same guy who she used to date earlier.
She broke up with Lucas.
Aana was still missing, Tom never made any effort to find her.
He went about his daily job as usual.
When Lucas was taking a bath the which again appeared in front of him.
Lucas knew that the witch might have something to do with anna's disappearance.
He tried to confront her, but the witch started tantrums.
She started smashing every piece of furniture, every photo, every item of the house.
She was enjoying this, it seemed Lucas was also enjoying this.
Hence he too joined her.
Being with her he was becoming like her, inhuman, ugly, emotionless.
When tom arrived from the job he was horrified and shocked seeing the house like this.
He was so frustrated and furious that he slapped Lucas pretty hard in the slap face game.
Tom was lashing out his frustration through this game.
The witcher saw this, she thought Tom was hurting Lucas.
She was about to attack him but Lucas stopped him.
He cryingly hugged his brother.
Lucas somehow saved his brother otherwise this could have been his last day.
By this time he was fully confused about whether the witch is good or bad.
Next Today Lucas finds Anna's body near that mansion.
The witch had killed her.
After some time the girls bullying gang attack Lucas and capture him.
The twin sisters grabbed Lucas, they asked Moriah to spit on Lucas.
Moriah hesitantly did that.
She was not angry at Lucas or wanted to bully him, she just got bullied into doing that.
Then everyone heard the grunting voice of that witch, they got scared.
Lucas took the opportunity he hit one of the twin sisters and ran away from there.
Twin sisters in rage started following him, everyone got dispersed.
Just then the witch appeared in front of Moriah, she hit her with a stone which caused the
sudden death of Moriah.
Lucas was horrified at seeing this, he started shouting at that witch, in anger he threw
stones at her but nothing happened she disappeared.
Twin sisters saw Moriah's body and informed the police.
The police chief arrested Lucas, he told Tom to get a lawyer.
At the interrogation, Lucas narrated the whole witch story but the chief dismissed it.
He was sure that Lucas had killed Moriah.
We hear a back story here.
Luca's dad was abusive, he used to hit Luca's mom.
One day when the chief was at their house to dodge the fight Lucas was fighting with
his dad.
His tantrums were very violent.
Chiff asks Lucas whether he is the witch in his story.
Tom visits the hospital where Moriah is declared dead.
Back at the police station the witch appears at the police station and kills every officer
on duty.
Lucas sees this in horror and runs to his house.
He calls Tom on his mobile.
The witch again appears here.
Lucas was in a deep dilemma whether the witch is his friend or foe.
He directly says to the witch that from now onwards they can't be friends.
Just then Tom arrived, he was in shock seeing that witch.
The witch started slapping him hard as Lucas did in the slap face game.
Lucas while crying shouted stop, Tom slapped back at that witch but it was late.
Lucas fired a couple of bullets at the witch, he then poked the knife miraculously.
Finally, the witch was bleeding before she vanished she pasted Lucas's face with the
blood.
Tom died in Lucas's arm.
As Lucas was crying police arrived and surrounded him.
They once again arrested Lucas.
The film ends here with this message.
The film’s ending is ambiguous.
So what the hell just happened.
Well, most of it is left to the viewer's interpretation.
Lucas's mental health started deteriorating after their parent's death.
But Tom never actually paid any attention to this.
Tom abused his brother, girls bullied him.
Lucas never got a chance to share his pain.
The witch Virago was Lucas's hallucination born out of this.
It was an imagination created in Lucas's mind.
Lucas's dad was abusive and violent, the genes were there.
Luca's killed Anna and Moriah without realizing it was him.
Anna tried to help Tom and Lucas but it was too much for a young girl.
Tom was also suffering from his own trauma.
He and others paid a heavy price for this.
Moriah was interested in Lucas but she was fearful of her friends.
The twins were despicable characters who thought bullying is cool.
This peer pressure caused Moriah to do what she did.
The mental health of children is very delicate, bullying and trauma can create unintended
consequences.
Overall this is a really powerful film, I liked it.
Its sound, VFX gets under your skin.
It's a watchable film.
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