Horror can come in any shape or form and can totally devour a person. It can be in the form of a tough experience, a troublesome event, or just being literally consumed. All three combine to provide a formidable opponent to siblings Wilson and Daphne Shaw in director Perry Blackshear’s When I Consume You.
The idea here is that evil can morph into many forms. We see this throughout When I Consume You. This aside, the title’s third and fourth words can even work as desires such as revenge, fear, and realization completely take control over a person.
When I Consume You Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:
When I Consume You opens with a shot of Daphne Wilson in a washroom. Her face is bleeding as though someone has struck her and she spits a tooth out into the sink. Based on the closeups, audiences can comprehend the terror on her face. The intense, eerie, and loud music right from the get-go lends a sinister feel to the proceedings and we expect something to pop up. After Daphne sits beneath the shower and allows the cold drink to consume her and refresh her, the screen cuts to a horrific yellow-eyed character. So we know that there is something around, and it oozes terror.
We then get introduced to her brother, Wilson, a janitor who wishes to be a teacher, but he gets rejected. Rejection is the norm for the sibling duo as Daphne gets rejected an adoption. Amidst the chaotic cuts from the house balcony, to the train, to the adoption office, and back to the house, Blackshear ensures one thing is established. The siblings have a strong bond with Daphne, handing him a pendant with a deeply personal message.
She is established as the stronger of the two. His paranoia relegates him to one who can’t survive without her. However, he must after she is ‘consumed’. Questions emerge through appearances on the screen, but Wilson’s confusion places him as an unreliable narrator; one that could be hallucinating. Hence, he can’t be believed. That is, until he must face his fear himself.
I like the touch of the director doubling up as the cinematographer, as the visualization and the ideation from the same gray cells ensure that the desired result comes out on screen without communication potentially diluting the craved impact. The touch of the unsteady camera when we see events from Wilson’s point of view makes for an apt method to present a disorienting experience of a confused individual. This choice remains even when the audience needs to view Wilson from a third-person point of view. Through this, Blackshear successfully provided a glimpse into the psychology of his leads. The calm and The confused.
As Wilson, Evan Dumouchel plays a tormented individual. His character arc is what drives When I Consume You. The desire for revenge for his sister’s murder, and his poor first encounter with ‘yellow eyes’ prompts him to become a tough weapon, embark on a training montage clip, and let evil consume him to thwart evil. The morph from a timid, confused individual to a raging indestructible force forms a large portion of this film.
As Daphne, Libby Ewing is the calming influence. She actually should be the tormented one after her run-ins with the ‘stalker’. Her appearance after the ‘consumption’ lends a feeling of steadiness to proceedings and Blackshear’s camera doesn’t shake so much. Despite her character ‘getting consumed’, she appears throughout the film and continues to protect her brother and act as a compass for him to thrive. She is crucial to Wilson being allowed to embark on his transformative journey. The film, well, ends on an expected note, but the manner in which it is delivered proved that
When I Consume You Movie Ending Explained:
The ending saw Wilson consumed by the book and become a soul-eater himself. However, he fell for the tricks and ended up stabbing himself whilst stabbing the demon. That wink was quite telling.
As a figment of imagination in Wilson’s mind, Daphne motivates him to go and lie somewhere where someone can find him. He survives, but at a cost as he has let a power consume his human self. Wilson meets the force every day, but it can’t touch him. It’s as though he has turned into one of the numerous hooded figures that walked past him before the cop appeared. However, he wasn’t totally consumed as he fought back, retained his soul, and even freed Daphne. Did the force just want Wilson to get consumed by evil and rage?
For a split second, I believed she was alive. However, that would be a tad far-fetched, as her body showed signs of decay when Wilson found her within the apartment. To clarify any more doubts, she revealed her sadness at leaving behind her brother in a world she now enjoys.
This implies that the stalking has finally stopped. Throughout the film, audiences learned that the stalker was after her for a long time and she remained an immovable object to protect Wilson. But isn’t Wilson also a part demon now?
Perhaps not, as the stalker used a trick to project himself into Wilson to stab the vessel rather than the parasite. But it backfired as the parasite got stabbed and Wilson, the vessel, was treated in the hospital and survived.
Read More: Motherly (2021) Movie Ending, Explained
Trailer
When I Cosume You (2021) Movie Links – IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes
When I Cosume You (2021) Movie Cast – Libby Ewing, Evan Dumouchel, MacLeod Andrews, Margart Ying Drake, Claire Siebers
