Shook Quick View; Grade: D-
Shook tells a story about a psychopathic dog killer, who has been going around town killing dogs. Recently during a fabulous runway photo shoot for a makeup line, a model's dog escaped the dog killer, but the model was brutally murdered. Because of this tragedy that occurred, social media influencer Mia (Daisye Tutor) decides to skip out on a rad party with her friends, as she instead babysits her sisters dog while she's away. Not only will Mia and the dog enjoy a night in together, they'll be acquainted by an unexpected fellow from the past, plus many fun games to play including a game that will choose survival for Mia's friends, family, and dog.
One positive I'll put out is I like the setup in the opening. It was a nice horror opening that helps setups the plot going forward, followed by a cool slasher sequence. I also liked within the opening during the photoshoot, it's done in an alleyway as it's not really a runway photoshoot you typically see from other Hollywood celebs, it's make believe just to make someones social media look good.
Shook was actually shaping up to be another knock off of When a Stranger Calls, basically a stranger calls Mia every now and then, as he threatens her life and people that she loves as well so it had similar vibes towards it. The film suddenly switches up, as we're introduced to the first of many aggravating plot twists. I thought this film would take in a different direction, as when Mia finds out everything is a joke, she suddenly loses her damn mind, she goes live with her many followers, as she tries to kill her friends. That would make actual sense, but unfortunately everything that follows on is extremely baffling, to the point where you just about hate everyone.
Now I'm not on anybody's side, I think Mia is extremely dislikable as she's extremely selfish and uncaring. But I can understand Mia leaning into her friends over her family, as not only has Mia lost touch with her family, however sometimes friends are much more valuable than family, just because you claim an honorable title doesn't necessarily mean you're atomically valuable to that person. The problem is all of Mia's friends are assholes, so it's hard for me to get behind Mia wanting to save her friends in the first place, because they don't even value Mia as a friend that she is.
As far as the antagonist that's doing all these horrific things, whether be killing all these dogs and torturing Mia's friends... Huh?! You mean to tell me in order for Mia to value your self worth, to teach her a lesson how you've been neglected by her as she rather choose her friends over the dog or you, you mean to tell me you couldn't just communicate with her instead doing all these horrible things, to people that don't deserve it?! What did Mia's friends do to deserve this?! They're assholes for sure, but however you expose their true selves as it turns out they have problems just like you, so what was the point in torturing them for?! What did those precious innocent little puppy dogs ever did to you?! Everything this person did into wanting to teach Mia an important lesson, is extremely sick in the mind, but also unneeded. Plus why did this person cared that much about Mia caring about this person? Seriously?! You hate this person and see no value in her, so why care this much to go all this way just for her to see you as a person?! It's just so damn stupid.
See it's hard for me to actually care about the events that are happening, when no one is likable at all. The film tries to create sympathy for these douchebag people, with settle reveals about their personal life, but then I remembered they just did a horrible thing to Mia for cash so I don't care about any of them. Same thing with Mia: She rather choose a friend who clearly wanted to backstabbed her, over the dog and her family member as she points out she's dying anyways so what's the point, so I don't care about her either. There's not a single character worth caring about, so I can't be invested in anyone's safety here, as the film just continues to baffle me with the level of disgust you see from these characters.
It also doesn't help that this film is in love with putting texts or videos on the walls and furniture like a projector. It was cool at first, but then they got too carried away as it becomes a rather distraction and a poor style issue. It also doesn't help this film has a TERRIBLE score, that either sounds terrible or it misplaced in scenes in which this certain tone of music doesn't work. It also doesn't help this film has terrible acting as a whole, like SHEESH. It really does not help that this film no longer wanted to an entertaining slasher film, as the opening was the only main highlight of horror we gotten out of this entire picture. The ending was not only cheesy and stupid, however we gotten an appearance from a small character that was entirely wasted... Seriously what was the point in featuring this guy as a cameo, if you weren't going to do anything cool with it? Just an extremely baffling horror film, that has baffling logic issues, character issues, just issues all around it's a very infuriating horror film to sit through honestly.
Overall, Shook is TRASH! I don't recommend this film at all, watch When a Stranger Calls. -Mitch Smietana