Touch Me (SXSW) Touches on Trauma, Codependency, Abuse, and the End of the World with Sci-Fi Horror Comedy Panache
Title: Touch Me
First Non-Festival Release: TBD
Director: Addison Heimann
Writer: Addison Heimann
Runtime: 100 Minutes
Starring: Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jordan Gavaris, Marlene Forte
Where to Watch: Check out where to find it here
This film’s review was written after its screening at the South by Southwest Film Festival in 2025.
The human mind is an incredible thing. Where it is capable of great feats, it can also be our biggest enemy when we’re at our lowest. People can certainly find themselves making the worst choices even knowing the destruction it will cause in their lives.
Joey (Olivia Taylor Dudley) is one such person. Living in her best friend Craig’s (Jordan Gavaris) home for the past five years after escaping abusive ex-boyfriend Brian (Lou Taylor Pucci), she is trying to put the pieces of her life back together when he re-emerges. Coaxed into returning to his secluded mansion, Craig tags along to make sure she is safe. Once there, the two discover that Brian’s touch isn’t just metaphorically addictive, it feels exactly like heroine, and they’d do anything to get more of it. A toxic game of competition forms between the two, as well as Brian’s helper Laura (Marlene Forte), where they strive to win out in a series of therapy exercises while Brian not-so-secretly tries to take over the world.
A technicolor meditation on self-destruction, Touch Me is a bold sci-fi horror comedy that hits more than it misses.
Kickstarting its story with a therapy exercise, Touch Me lays its thesis out in a breathless monologue detailing just a slice of Joey’s traumatic past. Unconventional yet enthralling, Joey’s introduction serves three major needs of the film. First, it lays bare Joey’s character: a self-destructive, self-deprecating, failure to launch with good heart and intentions overshadowed by her faults. This is only the beginning of her honest, and predictable, crash out. Second, it demonstrates that Touch Me has no plans of following conventions. A monologue is a tough sell in many films, especially if the writing or acting is shaky. So, starting a film with such a risk is a bold move for sure. Lastly, the blunt, shocking sense of humor amidst the trauma becomes the approach Touch Me takes to tackle its heavy topics. This angle does wonders in setting it apart from other films using more general depictions of trauma as a vehicle for serious horror.
The messiness of Touch Me works because of its hopelessly lost protagonists. Joey and Craig are easily endearing despite being certified losers. Neither has any prospects for work, romance, or anything beyond wasting their days away on nicotine and food delivery. Sure, their history of trauma is both lengthy and lurid, but their combined inability to do any work on themselves to make their lives better becomes their shared downfall. Enabling the worst in each other, it isn’t until they vie for Brian’s attention at his compound that their repressed frustrations with each other come back to destroy them.
But they both still love each other. That’s what makes them endlessly lovable and relatable despite their faults. A nuanced portrayal of a relationship where both recognize their unhealthy habits and role in maintaining them, Touch Me allows Joey and Craig to simmer in their discomfort. Few people would admit it but plenty of us have had a friendship like this. Its depiction is both fresh and important, especially for those hoping to take healthier steps.
As if stepping into a brightly neon-lit arcade, Touch Me promises a high-camp fever dream with its hyper-edited, sleek cinematography worthy of its extraterrestrial story. Mimicking its antagonist’s somatosensory overload, Touch Me is a visual feast. It’s no mistake that the gaudiness and hallucinatory aspects of Brian and his home contrast so starkly with Joey and Craig’s normal lives. When influenced so heavily by a narcissist, life becomes all about sweeping extremes. Much like the best friends, the audience gets swept in, almost hypnotized, by Brian’s charm. Swift, shocking, and pleasureful, Touch Me operates like the sweetest sugar rush of loving someone who loves you back, but only on their condition.
Its unique sense of humor is both a strength of Touch Me and its weakness. There’s a certain dryness to the dark comedy of Touch Me that has viewers double taking on how unexpected it gets with its material. Understandably, it is very difficult to pull off jokes about serious topics like sexual assault, abuse, relationship violence, and suicidal ideation, but Touch Me does it with a taste all its own. It comes down to timing, both from its performers and the script. Everyone is in on the joke, so the humor shines rather than falters under uncertainty. The jokes that don’t land are quickly overshadowed by the ones that do, and their impact is greater. Of course, mileage will vary but certified cinema freaks will get a giggle or two for sure here.
An acquired taste, Touch Me is another hit for writer/director Addison Heimann walking a tightrope between what is tasteful and what is challenging. Its niche humor and strange pacing may put some off, but its quirky characters, brilliant editing, and penchant for tentacle sex will win it for others. Horrifying, hilarious, and horny all the same, Touch Me is the sci-fi horror comedy you didn’t know you needed. The universe needs more of these films, and if we’re lucky enough, it’ll cinch distribution soon and get planted in screens and streaming services across the world.
Overall Score? 7/10
