Homewrecker – Toronto After Dark 2019

[imdb style=”white”]tt10560862[/imdb]

A young woman finds herself held against her will by an obsessive middle-aged woman desperate for a friend in Homewrecker. One day after an exercise class Michelle (Alex Essoe) begins a friendly conversation with Linda (Precious Chong), who recognizes her from the class. Learning that Michelle is an interior decorator, Linda invites her to take a look at her home. However, soon after arriving Michelle begins to learn that there’s something amiss about this middle-aged woman, especially when Linda doesn’t allow Michelle to leave.

Homewrecker is the feature-film debut from director and co-writer Zach Gayne, which can be described in its simplest terms as a darkly humourous version of the film Misery. The film focuses nearly entirely on the characters of Linda and Michelle, with actors Precious Chong and Alex Essoe being credited as co-writers. The only other central character in the film is Michelle’s husband Robert (Kris Siddiqi), who we learn has a greater role in this story than we were initially lead to believe.

There is a show-stealing moment about three-quarters of the way through Homewrecker, where Precious Chong’s quite unhinged character of Linda sings the entirety of Lisa Loeb’s 1994 hit song “Stay (I Missed You),” while Michelle is locked in a closet. This is arguably the highlight of a dark comedy that sports some great performances but has a rather basic plot, which is indeed quite reminiscent of Misery, including a moment of extreme violence that will just leave you speechless. However, I will still say that Homewrecker is a pitch-black dark comedy worth checking out.