Opus is the new horror film directed by Mark Anthony Green. It follows Ariel (Ayo Edebiri)a young writer who is one of the first few people to listen to the comeback album of 90’s Popstar, Alfred Moretti (John Malkovich). However Ariel soon realises that this event isn’t what it initially seemed.

To start with the positives, both lead performances, Edebiri and Malkovich, are definitely highlights. Edebiri is a rising star, and I’ve really enjoyed her work so far, and Opus makes use of her comedic talents, while also feeling like a break from her other comedic work. It gives us a look at potentially more dramatic work from Edebiri, who I feel will continue to kill it in the coming years. Malkovich gives a much different performance, but one that’s equally great. He’s campy when the role requires but becomes more menacing as the story develops. It was a treat to witness these two actors bouncing off of each other and I wish that the rest of the film around them was of the level of their performances.

The obvious knock on this film is that it’s painstakingly unoriginal. Several other people have already made the comparisons to films like Get Out, The Menu, Blink Twice, Midsommar, and many others and sadly this film just isn’t exploring new ground. I won’t spoil the twists but the twists do just feel predictable. I also think that the film isn’t fully sure of what it wants to say, and what it is trying to say is executed in a really unimaginative way. The filmmaking also didn’t quite come together for me. Green seems to be a more than competent filmmaker, and parts of this film definitely feel stylish, but certain music sequences just dragged for me, and felt much more about style than actually furthering the plot or telling us about characters.

Overall, I think this is a film that just didn’t work for me. As great as Edebiri and Malkovich were, the story was just too unoriginal and stale to ever really be interesting. I do feel that Mark Anthony Green has potential, and can go on to make interesting work, but this just didn’t come together at all. I’d give this a miss if I were you.

Overall Score – **