Our persistent want for self-care can generally really feel like its personal sickness. Whether you’re slapping in your each day deodorant or attending a weekly remedy session, “taking care” of your self means managing the signs of being a living-breathing individual… perpetually. It’s annoying, time-consuming, and, on this planet of wellness advertising, a profitable and consumable fixed. In “The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick,” filmmaker Pete Ohs examines snake oil culture as a method for exploiting each anxiousness and concern.
Co-written by the director/editor/producer and the film’s 4 lead actors, this sunny-yet-claustrophobic nightmare asks if the fake “healing” mentality — seen right here as a stranger-danger model of a weekend getaway you solely suppose you realize — is admittedly what’s making fashionable folks sick. Foregoing the influencer-inspired sheen of one thing just like the beauty thriller “Skincare,” this decidedly unusual SXSW premiere follows the grieving Yvonne (Zoë Chao) right into a pal’s rustic residence and unsettling life.
White linens, entire grains, gorgeous landscapes, and the possibility to “unplug” await Yvonne at a distant location. The promise of getting again to fundamentals in a time of emotional turmoil is recognizable — notably to millennials of a sure age — however the true nature of the tragedy impacting the protagonists isn’t clear at first. When the bird-like Camille (Callie Hernandez, additionally a producer) opens the entrance door to her picturesque cottage and brings Yvonne inside, her already-emotional home visitor is troubled to search out she’ll be sharing the intimate and idyllic area with two males she doesn’t know.
An ingenious prepare dinner named AJ (James Cusati-Moyer) and his actual property agent boyfriend, Isaac (Jeremy O. Harris, producer), welcome the brand new arrival with open arms, whilst an intense sense of discomfort settles over the scene. The oblivious hostess and her granola maybe-roommates/maybe-lovers(??) begin out innocent sufficient. There’s nothing mistaken with encouraging Yvonne to get up early and catch a “resplendent” dawn — or to forego her favourite consolation meals and check out the chef’s uncommon delicacies — is there? Yvonne, nonetheless shell-shocked from tragedy and staring down a bowl of what seems like free-range vomit, would beg to vary if the vibes weren’t already so unhealthy. Is she overreacting? Or are they pushing?
Normalcy and construction can do wonders for a beloved one coping with a troublesome time. And but, “The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick” makes the trio nagging Yvonne to work by means of no matter mysterious trauma is ailing her — within the most Anthropologie-like fashions possible — really feel extra like a psychological assault. The result’s vaguely akin to a extra queer tackle the Armitage property from “Get Out,” however is perhaps higher described as Marnie’s marriage ceremony episode from HBO’s “Girls” crossed over with the 2006 sci-fi horror movie, “Slither.” That second comparability oversells the gore a bit, however the James Gunn traditional is a robust trace for style aficionados seeking to guess on the true nature of the tick terror Ohs has in play.
Polite strategies morph into silent judgment earlier than the awkward strain builds to some extent so positive not even tweezers may pull the thorny social state of affairs out. Fed-up together with her pal however nonetheless famished from all that farm-to-table bullshit, Yvonne storms into the yard woods after only a few days. It’s solely a stroll to clear her head, she thinks, however again at Camille’s (and AJ’s and Isaac’s), no actual act of self-care can go unpunished. The subsequent morning, Yvonne gazes deep right into a classic mirror as she extracts a blood-sucking freeloader from her shoulder blade. The chunk is unhealthy. She ought to go to the hospital, proper? Wrong. The remedy for something that has ever damage anybody, her cozy captors say, is already right here.
Lyme illness sometimes lasts between two to 4 weeks when met with the suitable course of antibiotics. Running a breezy 80 minutes, “The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick” goes by quicker than that — though slightly countryside atmosphere goes an extended, great distance. Ohs’ newest function isn’t fairly as sturdy as his first film (he co-directed “Everything Beautiful Is Far Away” with Andrea Sisson in 2017) and he may have used a collaborator prepared to make extra aggressive edits. Sure, that may have the potential to grind the film’s period thus far down that it is perhaps reclassified as a brief. But in terms of not losing the dear useful resource of time, there’s no use nursing unbroken pores and skin.
Intriguing as it’s tedious, this wobbly narrative appears to yearn for the authorial readability of a bee sting however nonetheless hangs on like a confused parasite. There’s loads of symbolism to unpack right here, notably because it pertains to the forged’s ever-shifting queer dynamic and the philosophical collision between Yvonnne’s vulnerability and the opposite’s snide critiques. But what begins as a mesmerizing exhibition of detachment — anchored in a temper of stylish condescension and indifference so fashionable it ought to be on a Pinterest board — devolves right into a lackadaisical cruelty that’s much less compelling and never cohesive.
Despite having one in all its characters reference the title verbatim (which for good or unhealthy bought a giant chortle from me), “The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick” proves usually ineffective as a dramatic query. A peer-reviewed examine from the Mayo Clinic would possibly depart audiences with a extra satisfying, much less ethereal reply. But Ohs’ difficult new various to extra normal style fare remains to be pleasant as a recent and gutsy experiment. The aesthetic boasts simply sufficient creepiness to make you itch between scenes, and the movie’s extra-slippery lead performers/writers vacillate between the sinister and serene sides of leisure with such velocity and ease that small-bladdered people ought to rethink the toilet.
Of course, you realize what’s greatest for you higher than anybody else. That’s very true in terms of indulging in tasks like Ohs’ weird creature function dissecting one-sided relationships and so-called self-care. A recipe for impatience with the mistaken cinephiles however an progressive salve to the precise ones, “The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick” makes a long-lasting impression — even whether it is blotchy, pale, and a number of other rings shy of hitting that traditional tick-bite bullseye mark.
Grade: C+
“The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick” premiered at SXSW 2025.
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