A wish that removes another person's choice
Bear wants Nikki to return his feelings. A mysterious object seems to offer a way around the uncertainty of telling someone what you want and accepting that they may want something different. Once the wish changes Nikki's behaviour, however, the desired outcome becomes inseparable from the disturbing means used to obtain it.
The premise gives the film an uncomfortable starting point. Bear's loneliness can be understandable while his attempt to control another person remains troubling. Watching both ideas at once is more useful than assuming that the person making the wish must be the uncomplicated hero. The supernatural mechanism brings a question about consent into the centre of the horror.
The friends around Bear and Nikki
Michael Johnston plays Bear and Inde Navarrette plays Nikki. Cooper Tomlinson appears as Ian, Megan Lawless as Sarah and Andy Richter as Carter, the music-store boss. Curry Barker writes and directs. Their workplace and friendship connections place the unusual event inside an existing social group rather than isolating the central pair from everyone they know.
The 2025 year refers to the film's festival debut at Toronto. Its broad US theatrical release followed in May 2026. When comparing listings, use the title and director together, because Obsession is a title shared by other films. This entry concerns Barker's wish-driven supernatural horror story.
For an adult horror audience
The US R classification includes strong bloody violence, grisly images, sexual content, graphic nudity and pervasive language. A romantic wish is the engine of the story, but it does not make the film a conventional date-night romance. Choose it when everyone watching is comfortable with an attraction becoming a source of threat.
The clearest discussion afterwards concerns the difference between wanting a relationship and wanting a guaranteed response. What would a person have to give up to remove every possibility of rejection? That question can be explored without reducing Nikki to an obstacle in Bear's story. Her freedom is part of what the premise puts at risk.
