There’s something darkly poetic about The Girl in the Photographs being the last film produced by horror legend Wes Craven before his death — poetic in the sense that it feels like the horror genre itself briefly flatlined out of respect. Directed by Nick Simon and billed as a “thriller,” this film is less Scream and more “screaming at the TV for it to end.” It’s a stylishly shot, emotionally hollow mess that thinks it’s making a statement about modern voyeurism and art but ends up feeling like an influencer’s first attempt at a murder mystery TikTok.
If this movie were a photograph, it’d be one of those blurry, badly lit Polaroids that you immediately toss in the trash — right after realizing someone’s thumb is covering half the frame.
The Premise: American Psycho Meets Instagram Filters
The plot (and I use that term as generously as possible) revolves around Colleen, a grocery store clerk in the small town of Spearfish, South Dakota, who finds disturbing photos of mutilated women posted on the store’s bulletin board. The police, in a rare moment of genre self-awareness, immediately decide to do absolutely nothing. Because who investigates serial killer evidence in a horror movie?
Enter Peter Hemmings (Kal Penn), a Los Angeles fashion photographer who sees the murders as an opportunity to make art. Yes, this man sees snuff photos and thinks, “What a great branding opportunity.” So he flies back to Spearfish with his entourage of models and assistants to stage moody photoshoots while actual killers roam free.
Meanwhile, two greasy men with names like rejected boy band members — Tom and Gerry (no, really) — are murdering women and photographing their corpses. They have the hygiene of a gas station bathroom and the personality of one too. They kidnap, torture, and photograph their victims, because nothing says “edgy commentary” like turning serial killing into avant-garde art.
The whole thing plays like America’s Next Top Model: Crime Scene Edition.
The Tone: A Movie That Thinks It’s Saying Something Profound
The Girl in the Photographs desperately wants to be a meta horror commentary about our obsession with image, violence, and celebrity. It’s like the movie Se7en if Se7en had been written by someone who just discovered Tumblr.
There are plenty of long, brooding conversations about art, beauty, and the human condition, all delivered with the kind of self-importance usually reserved for first-year film students explaining why The Joker is “actually deep.” The movie thinks it’s exploring the blurred line between aesthetic and atrocity, but it never commits. Instead, it just sits awkwardly between pretentious and pointless — like a motivational poster about nihilism.
It’s the cinematic equivalent of someone looking you dead in the eye and saying, “Violence… is art,” then tripping over their own camera tripod.
The Characters: Paper Dolls in a Murder Diorama
Let’s start with Colleen (Claudia Lee), our heroine. She’s… fine. And I mean that literally — she’s just “fine.” She spends most of the film staring at things with mild concern, occasionally gasping when a dead body shows up. She has the emotional depth of an avocado, which, to be fair, makes her one of the more developed characters.
Kal Penn’s Peter Hemmings is supposed to be a satire of pretentious L.A. artists — the kind who wears scarves indoors and says things like “the light here is so authentic.” Instead, he comes across like a man trapped in an experimental deodorant commercial. His dialogue vacillates between self-absorbed nonsense and bizarre pep talks about modeling, as though Project Runway suddenly merged with Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
The killers, Tom (Luke Baines) and Gerry (Corey Schmitt), are perhaps the most fascinating failures of all. They’re presented as menacing and methodical, but they look like the type of guys who still argue about which Metallica album is the best. Their entire modus operandi is “kill people and take Polaroids,” which sounds cool on paper but plays onscreen like a couple of dropouts from CSI: Spirit Halloween Edition.
There’s also Ben, Colleen’s boyfriend, who’s mostly there to die, and a roster of models so indistinguishable that when they’re killed, you briefly wonder if you missed a scene introducing them. Spoiler: you didn’t. The movie just forgot to give them personalities.
The Direction: Wes Craven Deserved Better
Nick Simon directs the movie like he’s auditioning to shoot perfume commercials for psychopaths. Every frame is overly stylized — moody blue lighting, slow pans, glossy murder tableaux. You can almost feel the camera whispering, “This means something,” while the script shrugs and says, “Does it though?”
The pacing is glacial. The kills are infrequent. And when the violence finally arrives, it’s neither shocking nor satisfying — just another excuse for someone to monologue about art while covered in fake blood.
The cinematography tries to elevate things, but all the chiaroscuro lighting and high-fashion angles can’t distract from the fact that you’re watching a movie where two men named Tom and Gerry reenact Silence of the Lambs in a basement that looks like a Spirit Halloween display.
Even the editing feels confused. Scenes of brutal murder are followed by slow-motion shots of people looking pensive while drinking wine. The film can’t decide if it wants to be a slasher, a satire, or a student short called Art Hurts.
The Horror: Less “Terror” and More “Mild Discomfort”
Despite being classified as a horror-thriller, The Girl in the Photographs generates about as much fear as a broken printer. The kills are lazy, the tension nonexistent, and the only thing truly horrifying is Kal Penn’s haircut.
The “scary” moments consist of women being stalked by men with cameras — which could’ve been chilling if the film had any sense of rhythm or menace. Instead, it’s just awkwardly long shots of flashbulbs going off while someone breathes heavily off-screen.
At one point, a character is attacked in a hot tub. It should be shocking. Instead, it feels like an outtake from a rejected Baywatch Nights episode.
By the time the final photo tableau appears — a grim group portrait of all the victims — you’re too numb to care. The movie ends with another character discovering the photo, setting up a potential cycle of violence. But honestly, the only cycle I cared about was the spin cycle on my laundry, because I finished folding clothes halfway through this movie.
The Dialogue: Written by a Thesaurus on Drugs
The screenplay feels like it was written by someone who once overheard a conversation about American Psycho and decided to make it their entire personality. Characters toss around lines like:
“Death is the ultimate portrait.”
and
“We’re all models in the eyes of oblivion.”
Somewhere, Wes Craven’s ghost is shaking his head and muttering, “Not like this.”
Even the police dialogue sounds like filler:
“There’s no evidence a crime took place.”
Really? A photo of a dead woman stapled to the grocery store corkboard isn’t evidence? I guess small-town cops really are the same in every horror movie.
Final Thoughts: A Polaroid of Pretentious Nonsense
The Girl in the Photographs wants to be a sharp, meta-horror about our fascination with violence and beauty. Instead, it’s a glossy, empty shell that mistakes vapid style for substance. It’s like watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre if Leatherface also gave TED Talks about the male gaze.
It’s fitting, in a grimly ironic way, that this was Wes Craven’s last producing credit — a film about death that’s so lifeless it could’ve used an exorcism.
Final Score: 2/10
A horror movie that’s neither horrifying nor moving. Pretentious, plodding, and proudly pointless — the only real “thrill” is knowing it eventually ends. The girl in the photograph? She’s lucky — at least she doesn’t have to sit through the movie.
