The horror/thriller genres have been gleefully ensuring that we just can’t have nice things for decades as it party poops virtually everything by making it utterly terrifying. Enjoyed showering in the 50s? Psycho put an end to that pretty quick. Fancy a pleasant drive on the motoway in the 2000s? Final Destination says nope. Loved swimming in the 70s? Jaws, bitch.
However, one thing that movies currently really like to sink their teeth into and make horrifying is the growing trend of leaning into the darker side of a life spent online to really hit our dumbass, constantly online species where it hurts. But while such films as Unfriended, Host and Dashcam thrust horror scenarios upon content creators and vlogers, 2018s Cam logged on to a slightly different, but more salacious target: Webcam models.
As we take a step into the online world that managed to totally undermine the porn industry in a shockingly short time, obsession spreads like a virus in both sides of the webcam in a way that not even incognito mode can fix…
Alice Ackerman is a camgirl on a website known as FreeGirlsLive who posts her sexy live shows under the name Lola_Lola. While she has plenty of subscribers who are more than happy to donate money as she fulfills their hastily typed in whims, she also likes to try and stand our by putting a bit of extra oomph into her content by adding violent pranks to her shtick, such as faking a bloody suicide when dared. But while she basks in a sea of memes, gifs and emojis as she cavorts for her unseen audience, Alice yearns to climb the site’s ranking system to scrape her way into the top 50 girls on the site. It also turns out that that out of her subscribers she has a couple of loyal “favorites” in the form of Arnold and Barney who she communicates with privately to score extra funds – but while Lola_Lola is a fearless exhibitionist, Alice in real life is more withdrawn and uncertain of herself and keeps her online life a secret from her mother and brother, instead telling them that she works in web development.
However, things start to go array after a rival poster on FreeGirlsLive pulls a trick that absolutely tanks Alice’s ranking and in an attempt to salvage matters she does a more extreme show than she normally does. This seems to be the catalyst for a bizarre form of identity theft she’s that not only can she no longer log into her account, but she finds that she’s somehow already online doing another live show – but if Alice is there watching it, how can she also be live? Assuming that the website has glitched and is playing an old segment of hers by mistake, Alice contacts the website but to no avail.
But is this really a computer malfunction, or has she been hijacked by an exact double who has suddenly taken over her online persona? Either way, the fact that Alice now no longer has control of her image on her site soon pushes her into some understandable realms of paranoia that only extreme actions can fix.
With people selling their image every day on virtually every site you can imagine, Cam is obviously straining to be a harrowing paranoia thriller for the OnIyFans generation; but thanks to the fact that writer Isa Mazzei actually loosely based the thriller on her own experiences as a camgirl, the movie chooses to not take the “safe” route Hollywood usually opts for these. In fact, as the movie takes you behind the scenes of this phenomenon, it’s tough not to be reminded of the erotic thrillers that Brian De Palma used to make such as Dressed To Kill or Body Double. By this is that even though we a presented with women in various states of undress doing sexual things, the overuse of neon lighting and the fact that the women are presenting themselves as objects gives the movie a deeply sleazy undertone that feels pretty uncomfortable even before the bizarre identity theft plot kicks in.
Simply put, the live of a camgirl looks pretty fucking awful, but the movie abmirably puts a lot of focus into just how fucking hard doing this is. While some would understandably dismiss making a living this way as not having a real job, the fact that Alice has to pay for the set up and keep coming up with new content all the time to keep her subscribers hooked means that it genuinely seems to be a hellish existence. Is she taking advantage of her subscribers just as much as they are taking advantage of her? Sure, but the mouth breathers at home don’t have to maintain that glassy smile while misogynistic comments and demeaning memes whisk by on her message thread and the film does well to push that sordid tone that lurks whenever someone works in some sort of sex industry in a certain kind of movie.
However, after around roughly half an hour of build up where the script and first time director Daniel Goldhaber take great pains to explain what it is that a camgirl actually does, problems start to appear when the actual plot steps in to take the load. You see, the filmmakers do such a good job of making Alice’s job so mired in need and desperation that when the doppelganger suddenly takes over her account, it genuinely seems more like a blessing than a curse. I mean sure, she’s not getting the money that this fake Lola is apparently getting and it’s always disconcerting when someone screws with your identity on line, but I just couldn’t get behind the fact that a truly awful thing has occured. Maybe it’s because I’m not spending the lion’s share of my existence trying to whip up endless content for the Internet aside from banging out one or two reviews a day, or as a male I don’t get the full extent of someone having their sexual persona used without their permission, but the on screen life of a camgirl just seemed far grimmer than the issues she was fighting.
Still, while the final reveal may not be as spectacular as some may be hoping (which admittedly makes it far more realistic), the climax goes to some pretty dark places and lead actress Madeline Brewer, with her huge, staring eyes, manages to convey the hungry need that online personalities gain in their quest for evermore clicks. There’s also a nice touch when the movie flat out insists that the law is utterly incapable of truly understanding the ramifications of online issues when two cops not only remain utterly nonplussed when trying to understand the actual problem (“Just stay off the internet” is the unhelpful advice), but one even makes a misogynistic pass at her while claiming it’s a compliment.
A potentially creepy concept is somewhat swapped by the message that everyone’s pretty fucked up and desperate to be involved with this sort of thing and as a result, it becomes somewhat tough for someone not familiar with this world to gather up much empathy. However, when it comes to creating a genuinely disconcerting tone involving the life of someone who delivers kicks for clicks, maybe it’s a good idea that we all have a little less screen time from now on.
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