Imagine showing up to a college party, getting blackout drunk, and waking up to find not only your hangover but an entire second version of yourself doing the same dumb things all over again. That’s +1 (or Plus One, if you’re not into punctuation-based titles)—a 2013 science fiction horror comedy from Dennis Iliadis that somehow fuses The Twilight Zone, Project X, and a really bad breakup into one existential rager.
It’s the kind of movie that dares to ask: what if your worst night ever got stuck on repeat—literally?
“The Night Everything Doubled, Including the Stupidity”
Our hero, David (Rhys Wakefield), is the kind of guy who thinks grand gestures can fix emotional immaturity. He surprises his girlfriend Jill (Ashley Hinshaw) at her fencing competition—because nothing says romance like interrupting someone mid-sabre duel—and promptly ruins everything by flirting with the wrong fencer.
She storms off, furious, and David spends the rest of the movie trying to win her back the only way college guys know how: by going to a party full of neon lights, bad decisions, and suspiciously unlimited alcohol.
Meanwhile, David’s best friend Teddy (Logan Miller) is on his own mission—to sleep with anything that moves, breathes, or appears sentient. There’s also Allison (Natalie Hall), the film’s socially awkward bystander, and Melanie, Teddy’s soon-to-be regret (played with the right balance of hot and homicidal).
Everything is normal, or at least normal by college standards, until a meteor hits nearby and turns the power off for a few seconds. When the lights come back on, so do everyone’s duplicates—from an hour earlier. It’s like déjà vu, except this time déjà vu wants to kill you and steal your girlfriend.
“Time Loop, Meet Tequila Shot”
At first, the whole “everyone has a duplicate” thing is just weird. The doubles are harmless, repeating their actions exactly as before. But soon, things start spiraling into what can only be described as a cosmic identity crisis fueled by Red Bull.
David realizes this is his second chance—literally—to fix his breakup with Jill. So he decides to seduce Jill’s duplicate, a plan that’s equal parts romantic and deeply psychotic. Teddy, meanwhile, panics after realizing his duplicate might also be trying to get lucky, resulting in the kind of chaos that makes Freud do backflips in his grave.
As the night unfolds, the time loops close in, meaning the duplicates get closer and closer to real time—and eventually, they start interacting. You can guess how well that goes. It’s like watching the world’s worst group therapy session, except everyone has a knife.
“When Science Fiction Meets College Dysfunction”
Director Dennis Iliadis (of The Last House on the Left remake fame) crafts a horror premise that’s surprisingly smart under all the glow sticks and bad EDM. Beneath the party mayhem and bloody chaos is a genuine anxiety: what if you could literally confront the worst version of yourself—and they were having a better time than you?
+1 takes that idea and runs with it—straight into madness. Watching David manipulate his duplicate scenario to fix his love life feels both tragic and hilarious. He’s not a monster, just a guy who doesn’t realize he’s turning into one.
By the time he’s knocking out his own double and wooing the copy of his ex-girlfriend, you realize the film isn’t about time travel—it’s about self-delusion. And possibly how to make gaslighting a sport.
“Doubling Down on Dumb, and It’s Glorious”
The beauty of +1 is that it never takes itself too seriously. Sure, it flirts with existential dread and moral ambiguity, but it’s also fully aware that its characters are idiots in body spray.
Rhys Wakefield plays David like a golden retriever who’s just been hit by the concept of regret. Logan Miller’s Teddy is the perfect comic foil, treating the apocalypse like an inconvenience between hookups. And Ashley Hinshaw gives Jill enough emotional depth to make you root for her, even as you secretly hope she mace-sprays everyone by the end.
Even Allison, played by the Dengel twins, delivers some of the film’s strangest and best moments—particularly when she befriends her own double. Their scenes are oddly tender, like a self-help seminar hosted by your reflection.
“The Party’s Dead (and So Are You)”
When the duplicates finally start to fight back, things escalate fast. What begins as a night of “Whoa, there’s another me!” quickly devolves into “Holy crap, that other me has a knife!”
The original partygoers realize too late that killing their doubles doesn’t solve anything—because every blackout just brings them closer to merging. It’s like the worst group project in history: one mistake and suddenly everyone’s dead.
And then comes the final twist—David kills the real Jill to be with her duplicate. It’s both insane and fitting, because at this point, reality has completely given up. The movie ends with the duplicates and originals merging into one unified mess of bad decisions. David and Jill (or whatever’s left of them) walk off into the sunrise, proving that love truly conquers all—even temporal paradoxes.
“A Visual Trip Through Chaos and Confusion”
Visually, +1 is a strobe-lit fever dream. The cinematography oscillates between “college promo video” and “art installation about despair.” The glowing lights, slow-motion dancing, and surreal edits make you feel like you’ve had too much sugar and regret.
The VFX team, Lola Visual Effects, deserves a medal—or at least a drink—for seamlessly layering duplicate actors into every scene. The result is eerie and hypnotic, like watching your Snapchat story possessed by demons.
And let’s not overlook the soundtrack—pulsating, chaotic, and exactly what you’d hear right before someone accidentally opens a portal to hell at a rave.
“Rom-Com From the Twilight Zone”
Beneath the blood and sci-fi weirdness, +1 is ultimately a dark romantic comedy. David’s desperate need to rewrite his past mistakes becomes a literal battle against himself. It’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind if Jim Carrey had replaced brain surgery with light murder.
The final scene—where all versions merge into one—is oddly hopeful. Maybe this new David really did learn something. Or maybe he’s just a cosmic Frankenstein who’ll screw it up again tomorrow. Either way, it’s strangely uplifting in a “we’re all doomed but at least we’re together” kind of way.
“Why It Works: Chaos With Purpose”
What makes +1 stand out from other party-gone-wrong films is its commitment to controlled chaos. It’s trashy, yes, but also intelligent—like if Skins read a philosophy book and decided to stage an existential crisis.
Dennis Iliadis doesn’t just want you to laugh; he wants you to squirm, think, and then laugh again. It’s a film about identity, choice, and how we’re all just one blackout away from ruining everything.
“Final Thoughts: Double the Fun, Double the Therapy Bills”
+1 is the cinematic equivalent of waking up after a house party to find a meteor in your backyard and your clone raiding your fridge. It’s weird, wild, and unexpectedly profound.
It takes the college movie formula—booze, sex, bad decisions—and injects it with science fiction existentialism. It’s messy, morally gray, and absolutely entertaining.
Sure, it’s a bit uneven and occasionally confusing, but that’s part of its charm. It’s a film about mistakes looping endlessly, and it embraces that chaos like a drunk hug.
Verdict: ★★★★☆
+1 proves that sometimes two wrongs don’t make a right—but they do make one hell of a party.
