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Host is a film who's genre can most aptly be described as live-action horror. The film comes compliments of the good people at Shudder and seems to be set somewhere in England, where a young lady named Haley decides to host a Zoom conference call with a few of her friends, no doubt an attempt to take the sting out of the isolation brought on as a measure to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus. But it isn't board games, drinking games, or even just casual chatting that forms the primary activity for this digital gathering, but rather something a little more unorthodox/original, a video call séance.
Haley invites an experienced medium to guide the group through this activity, and the medium invites them to bring along a personal item that would serve as a link to someone they knew that passed into the astral plane (shot). It doesn't take a medium to predict that some items would play a more significant role than others in the chaos to come, and while some approach the séance with eye-rolling skepticism, others feel general reluctance at interfering with the unknown. With the candles lit, the eyes closed and a mental link created, the séance begins, starting with as little drama as you can imagine, small false alarms serving as appetizers to what is to come as the film progresses.
To spice things up a little, one of the participants named Jemma decides to pretend to have been engaged with by something that she claims to be the spirit of an old classmate long passed. While her performance fools both her friends and no doubt the audience, she confesses soon after that she had made it all up, not knowing that her attempt to liven the proceedings up has far more serious consequences than she could have ever imagined. Unbeknownst to her, Jemma's disrespect for the spirits, and the fabrication of a false one, created a mask of sorts that acts as an open invitation for any entity to come onto their plane, an invitation gladly accepted by one that is anything but friendly.
The demonic being goes on to taunt and torment all the friends involved in the video call, even cutting off their connection to the medium who served as the only individual capable of providing expert instruction on the situation. The entity doesn't play favorites in its provocations, violently engaging with each person in turn, the social rules put into place due to COVID-19 clearly not applying to this being from beyond, social distancing a safety measure only applicable to the living. While the paranormal activity begins with the usual bumps, knocks, and breaking of personal possessions, the activity grows more and more violent as time goes on, to the point where even familial relations inside the house of the participants are not safe.
It's hard not to like the film Host, not for its concept, which is one we've seen time and time again in similar films about demonic entities and their invasion into the homes of the living, but rather the very framework within which it is created, which is the current reality that we live through due to the COVID-19 virus. To my mind, Host has taken a big leap forward with regards to the horror genre, and the first that I am aware of that has so effectively used popular modern-day technology to achieve its purposes. Indeed the uniqueness in this film lies in the closeness to our current "new normal" and our ability to relate to these circumstances in a way that we couldn't with films that have shown post-apocalyptic environments or deadly viruses that have turned people into monsters, for example. The dilemma the characters face feels more real due to the very realness of the worlds presently shared dilemma.
Host is a frown turned upside down; it's a delicious helping of lemonade from the lemons that were hurled at us from the world like rocks from a catapult. The effective use of Zoom, one of, if not the most popular video calling software at the present moment, is also a large part of the films brilliance, its features used tremendously well to amplify the effects of the film, from the way the events were nestled neatly within its 40-minute free call limit, to the creative use of its face skins and audio settings. The film also may have had another unintentional piece of brilliance in the form of its short run time.
Host clocks in at a little under an hour, and may have just set the blueprint for films to follow along to in providing viewers in the current fast-paced world with films that get to the point quickly and make us feel less guilty for spending our time watching movies. While it's easily arguable that there is only so much to be done within Zoom's allotted 40 minutes of call time, the length of the film felt like the perfect middle ground between short films, and longer feature films. Again, while, in essence, we are dealing with a tried and tested genre, what set this film apart was the methods used to transmit the scares.
The makers of this film get large points for seeing possibility within the pandemic, and while we certainly hope that said pandemic will not last forever, this offering opens the floodgates for more to use this very real foundation of ours for telling a good story. Host is a unique, innovative, and terrifying film that cannot be missed.
