The film, released May 29, is being shown at Marcus Theaters in Oshkosh.
Fans know the lore started in Oshkosh with a photo taken more than 20 years ago. It prompted YouTube shorts. At long last, it’s a full-fledged horror movie.
There’s as much buzz about how “Backrooms” came to the screen as there is about the movie itself — and there is a lot of buzz about the movie.
There deserves to be. This movie will mess you up, man, in the best horror-movie ways.
What’s the story behind ‘Backrooms?’
The film began life as a photo taken in 2003 inside a store in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. HobbyTown was undergoing renovations, and you can see various rooms through the openings; the walls and carpet are a sickly yellow, as if the building had jaundice. Fluorescent lights complete the creepy photo (which was just meant to document the renovation).
In the late 2010s, the photo began showing up online and blossomed into a full-on sensation. Long story short: Parsons, who wasn’t born when the original photo was taken, turned it into “The Backrooms (Found Footage)” a short horror film, and expanded it into a series of short films. If you’re up on creepypasta and 4chan and liminal horror and noclip, there’s plenty of lore for you to dive into.
But in much the same way a film based on a novel has to stand on its own — there shouldn’t be a prerequisite for enjoying a movie — “Backrooms” has to work as a standalone movie, apart from all that’s come before. In other words, you need to be able to walk in cold and still enjoy it.
You can — with the warning that it is mind-bending and scary (and if you’re claustrophobic, you’ll go nuts). Parsons proves expert at creating dread; the movie is practically soaking in it. There are some visual scares, and the set design is wild, contributing a lot to the feeling of suspense. You just know something is going to go wrong. As with the original photo, everything is a little off. Until it’s really off.
If this is all a bit vague, that’s by design. The details are best left to discover on your own. Set in the Santa Clara Valley in 1990, it begins with found footage of someone exploring the rooms, and things going awry. Then we meet Clark (Ejiofor), the manager of Cap’n Clark’s Ottoman Empire, one of those sad, tacky furniture outlets that haunt shopping centers.
What is ‘Backrooms’ about?
Clark is a frustrated architect who has had to take this job. We learn this through his sessions with Mary (Reinsve), his therapist. He’s frustrated, angry, with a temper. Role-playing exercises are particularly painful and volcanic. One day at work, as he’s closing up, Clark sees flickering lights from the stairway to the basement. He goes down to investigate and discovers a portal which leads him through the wall.
On the other side, Clark finds an empty room (inspired by the furniture store photo). But it’s off somehow. As he explores the other rooms in the basement, things get even weirder. A stop sign with the word “stop” backwards. Partially sunken furniture. Shattered furniture. And most disturbingly, it sounds like someone or something else is down there with him.
Clark enlists the help of Kat (Lukita Maxwell), one of his employees, and her video-camera-wielding boyfriend Bobby (Finn Bennett), to explore further. When that goes south, Mary — who has her own suppressed history — finds herself heading to Cap’n Clark’s to investigate further.
What she finds there is unsettling, to say the least. The film deals with the unreliability of memory, with repressed trauma, with the inability to be honest with yourself and others. It deals with these things in about as creepy a way as possible.
That’s not all. There’s another layer to everything, which devotees of the short films will recognize. If you are the sort of movie fan who appreciates a director who doesn’t tie everything up in neat little bows, you’ll love this. It’s at times confusing, at times frustrating.
But it feels as if the director, Kane Parsons, maintains control over every frame of the film. He knows where he wants to go, even if at times, like in the Backrooms, it’s sometimes hard to follow. That’s the mark of a good filmmaker.
After all of what led to making “The Backrooms,” it will be interesting to see what comes next. You don’t have to fully understand his film to appreciate it, and that’s maybe the highest compliment of all.
‘Backrooms’
Director: Kane Parsons
Cast: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Mark Duplass
Rating: R for language and some violent content/bloody images
How to watch: In theaters Friday, May 29
Reach Goodykoontz at bill.goodykoontz@arizonarepublic.com. Facebook: facebook.com/GoodyOnFilm. Media commentary with a side of snark? Sign up for The Watchlist newsletter with Bill Goodykoontz.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Oshkosh link to ‘Backrooms’ lore grows with film release
Reporting by Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic / Arizona Republic
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