“9 Windows” (2024) by Lou Simon tells the story of a woman confined to her room searching for opportunities to troll and abuse anybody she dislikes online. However, this tendency is symptomatic of her traumatic history. The event that has left her confined to the room and the wheelchair has also confined her to a mental state that is irrational and highly unhealthy. This is a story of Liza and the extremities of the occurrences on the internet that in turn help her find a way back to healing.
9 Windows (2024) Plot Summary and Movie Synopsis:
What does not kill makes one bitter?
The film begins with a freak accident of the protagonist, Liza, who was headed for her FBI training at Quantico with her parents. The accident kills her parents and leaves Liza with paraplegia. The accident, however, has left her lonely and extremely bitter. So, as a pastime, she chooses to troll vloggers online with hateful comments that range from body shaming to wishing death. The only person who is allowed to venture into Liza’s inner world is her physiotherapist, Jeff.
One night, after her regular routine of trolling, when she prepares to retire for the day, one video of a dog whimpering in pain arrests her attention after most of the other vloggers turn offline. The video is of an unidentifiable person burning a dog alive. When Liza informs the Cyber Investigation Division, Detective Boyle puts his point straight that abusing animals can only be seen as a misdemeanor and not a crime in the merit of solid charges. This infuriates Liza and she seeks help online. But, given her repute as a bully, people dismiss her plea. The video stands deleted and the IP address obliterated which further makes it obscure to search for the evidence.
Is Liza Uncovering a Dark Truth or Falling into a Trap?
The next night a similar video creeps up but it is the video of a man tied to a chair in what seems to be a basement. The man is gagged and throttled to death. Liza noticed that the video was seen by multiple people who were streaming at the time but no one reported it. Boyle however shows his doubts to blindly trust Liza due to her medical history and her being mentally unfit. He also pulls up evidence pointing towards her cyberbullying which leaves the possibility open that Liza might be unable to discern the fake from the real. This causes a rift between Liza and Jeff. Boyle advises Liza to seek therapy.
The next we know, a third video of killing pops up. At least this time, Jeff is there to witness that Liza is in fact not hallucinating or lying. In the third video, a woman similarly gagged is stabbed to death. The video cuts to black at the exact moment the woman is about to be decapitated. This time however Liza manages to screen record to save the video and produce it to Boyle. Boyle ropes in his associate, former FBI agent Detective Thurgood.
Liza puts her amateur sleuth skills to use and finds a pattern with the choice of usernames in all these videos. She notices that the usernames being used all hark back to notable serial killers in history, from Daniel Harold Rolling to John Wayne Gacy. Liza also tracks the probable site of the killings– a place close to the tracks of the commuter train in the suburbs.
Is Liza on the Verge of Becoming a Hero or Crossing a Dangerous Line?
One of the vloggers on the net, who has been subjected to Liza’s prying eyes and caustic comments, decides to kill herself in a livestream. It is Liza’s prompt response and action to alert the concerned authorities that saves the woman’s life. Simultaneously, another video appears where a man gagged and similarly tied to the chair like the two previously slained get his head drilled by a drilling machine.
Liza tracks down a man on social media by the name of Hignite by using the reflection on the knife from the video and running it through facial recognition software. When Liza feels a bit hesitant to own up to hacking into the website to retrieve the IP address of @MsLonely aka Christina and the killer, Thurwood assures her it’s only for the greater good. Liza’s skills even impress Thurwood and he hints at taking it further by considering having her associated with the FBI in some capacity in the future.
9 Windows (2024) Movie Ending Explained:
Does Liza manage to unmask the online killer?
The news started broadcasting Hignite’s face everywhere as the main suspect in the disappearance and killing of three people. Hignite prepares to leave the country. However, the surveillance at the airport has their attention zoomed in on him. The involvement of Liza being closely associated with the police comes to the forefront. Thurgood informs Liza that the police have found no employment record so it is impossible to track down Hignite’s real background.
Liza asks Thurgood to look for a place that is close to the Blue Line and has a place to dispose of bodies. While aiming in the dark, Liza finds a funeral home whose appearance closely resembles the setting of the videos. She alerts Jeff on her finding and leaves him a voicemail. However, Hignite finds Liza and abducts her by disrupting the electricity in her apartment. When Jeff arrives to meet Liza, he finds her gone. Another livestream begins this time Liza is the prey.
Jason Hignite begins torturing Liza and flaunts the killings as his work of art. As he proceeds to slay her, Jeff picks up the location and passes it on to Boyle. Boyle reaches the site in time and manages to save Liza from the maw of Hignite. It is Boyle who puts Hignite to eternal sleep. The film then cuts to several months later when Jeff and Liza have started their lives together. Liza is now slowly recuperating and gaining the strength to walk without any help. Liza finally finds her way back to the FBI and leaves her job as the analyst in the marketing platform behind. With it, she leaves behind her unhelpful tendencies and her life as a bully.
