USA, 2026
Review:JA Kerswell
In this excellent Giallo-inspired slasher movie, a free-spirited male sex worker and a buttoned-up gay architect reluctantly team up to uncover the identity of a vicious killer after they are both implicated in a brutal series of murders. With one eye on current social issues and the other on suspense, the film creates a bawdy love letter to Italian thrillers of the 1970s and 1980s. UNTIL YOU’RE ALONE is very possibly director Christopher Wesley Moore’s finest work to date.
Drew’s (Will Lovorn) relationship with his husband, Owen (Roger Conners), has grown stale. The architect is devoted to his job, while Owen stays at home and struggles to write a novel. He also has nightmares (about his dick being lopped off), probably inspired by news reports of male sex workers being killed and dismembered in the county. Drew is horrified when Owen gets drunk and embarrasses him in front of conservative new clients, a pastor, Greg (Jeff Buchwald), and his wife, Mona (Jo-Ann Robinson), for whom he is designing a new church.
Frustrated by their lack of intimacy, Owen turns to webcams and connects with Connor (played by the director Moore), but is perturbed when another user warns him off. However, when Drew is working late and his sister Elise (Keni Bounds), who is temporarily living with them, is out for the night, Owen invites Connor over for a date, which he naively thinks will be a free hookup. While Connor is in the shower, someone attacks Owen and beats him to death with a hammer. Returning unexpectedly early, Drew stumbles across the murder scene at the same time as Connor; each assumes the other is the killer, and Connor flees. The detective investigating informs Drew that things aren’t looking good, telling him he has two days to find the man he said he saw in the house before he will likely be arrested for his husband’s murder.
Drew has no choice but to become an amateur sleuth to save his own skin and avenge his husband’s death. After tracking down Connor, the pair deduce that someone else was responsible for the murder. Drew asks for Connor’s help. At first reluctant, he agrees to investigate and help unmask the killer, a task made more urgent when they realise they could be the next victims …
The director’s previous films have combined slasher cinema with pressing social issues, such as BLESSED ARE THE CHILDREN (2016) (abortion) and CHILDREN OF SIN (2022) (forced conversion therapy). With UNTIL YOU’RE ALONE, Moore introduces themes of bigotry, repression, and hypocrisy, all seen through the eyes of a gay filmmaker reacting to glaring divisions plaguing modern-day North America. Although perhaps here in a more subtle way, with the social commentary underpinning the narrative without necessarily becoming the main focus.
Moore successfully transplants the intrigue and fun of the classic Giallo to modern-day Mississippi, with two engaging central performances by Lovorn and Moore aided by a powerhouse turn by Moore regular Robinson. As the archetypal odd couple drawn together by events beyond their control, Moore plays a man desperately hanging onto the fading currency of youth prized by his profession, who helps Drew become less uptight and accept and embrace freedom in his own sexuality. Perhaps past criticism of the director’s work has dwelled on his tendency to feature lengthy dialogue scenes, but here the characters are so well drawn that these diversions provide not only fascinating vignettes (with the kind of flashes of quirky incidental humour that people tend to forget Dario Argento used in films such as DEEP RED (1975)), but help build the type of characterization rarely seen in low-budget horror cinema. It also works in the context of the director paying homage to the slow burn of 1970s genre films, with the sleuthing pair’s dynamic helping drive their—and the audience’s—journey to unravel the film’s mysteries through colorful locations, including a near-deserted drag club solely populated by two bored, sassy drag queens.
However, Moore doesn’t skimp on the horror-thriller elements, as the film features scenes of thrilling suspense and bursts of shocking violence. He understands that the best Gialli are a mix of eroticism, intrigue, mayhem, and an embrace of the genre’s inherent ludicrousness. UNTIL YOU’RE ALONE wears its influences on its sleeve without being overwhelmed by them, with clever nods to Gialli such as Dario Argento’s THE BIRD WITH THE CRYSTAL PLUMAGE (1970) and a partial recreation of an infamous murder scene from DEEP RED. The film even opens with the black-gloved killer selecting a bladed weapon from a box lined in red velvet—and the soundtrack, by Luke Zwelsky, is an effective pastiche-cum-homage to the frequent Argento collaborators Goblin. There are also nods to Juan Piquer Simón's wonderful trashterpiece PIECES (1982)—via fellow Spanish director Narciso Ibáñez Serrador’s influential Giallo-adjacent THE HOUSE THAT SCREAMED (1969)—in the gleefully outrageous cock-brushing conclusion to the film. There are also acknowledgments of North American films influenced by the Giallo, such as Alfred Sole’s ALICE SWEET ALICE (1976), whose psycho here will wear a yellow Macintosh regardless of the weather.
Perhaps the biggest shock of all is that UNTIL YOU’RE ALONE cost only about $20,000 to produce. However, you wouldn’t know it. Largely free of the issues that can affect microbudgeted horror films (such as muffled sound and wildly varying acting abilities), Moore has matured hugely as a filmmaker, and he makes the absolute most of what he has; projecting a quality onto the film that heroically defies his budget. This lack of funds is only apparent occasionally, such as the lack of a police presence outside a single detective, but it doesn’t really distract at all. The film looks superb (shot in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio), with confident and inventive framing, neon blue and pink hues calling to mind ‘80s Gialli, and even the use of a split-diopter in one scene.
Dario Argento, who, in a progressive move, often featured gay characters in his films without resorting to ridicule, unlike some of his peers, once expressed, during his 1970s heyday, his desire to one day film a Giallo that predominantly featured them. That never happened, but Moore makes it a reality. UNTIL YOU’RE ALONE is a must-see for fans of Queer genre cinema and, really, everyone else.
BODY COUNT 8:
Female 2 / Male 6
UNTIL YOU'RE ALONE (2026) Trailer
