Obsession (2026)
Obsession: Local man gets precisely what he thinks he wants.
That would be a lie, of course. Obsession is a pseudo comedy-thriller where a monkey’s paw results in a regular dude getting the psychotic yandere girlfriend experience with an extra emphasis on psychosis. What our male lead wishes for is, specifically, for Nikki to love him more than anything else in the world.
Throughout the movie Nikki shifts between varying degrees of extreme psychosis, though she isn’t really a character, so much as an object that Bear enacts a wish upon, and that is where the silent ‘horror’ of the film lies.
“Just because you chose it for her doesn’t mean it isn’t real.” Is the line said by the mysterious wish granter on the phone, which is an interesting phrase that I would more associate with BPD more than psychosis. People with BPD choose other’s love for them or for others, it most commonly is a defence mechanism, but that doesn’t make it any less real for the person with BPD.
It’s interesting that so much of the horror focuses on what Nikki does to Bear, as opposed to the fact that it is evident that Nikki is on some level aware of the fact that she’s being mind-controlled and is effectively in perpetual psychological torture to the point that she tries to kill herself when she briefly regains control.
Hell, even when Bear’s presented with the (false) option of cancelling the wish, he instead asks if the terms of the wish could be adjusted despite his observations of her dissonance and suffering. He got what he wanted, the girl he loved to love him back, he got laid, and even then he doesn’t want it to end, he just wants it to be different (but in the way that he wants things to be different).
Instead of changing himself to be someone she might be able to love, he instead changes her into someone who loves him: someone who isn’t Nikki.
“Just be Nikki.” he begs her.
“I can’t be Nikki!” she responds. Yes, because Nikki doesn’t love him, so the thing that “is” Nikki isn’t actually Nikki.
The new Nikki is the kind of person who will hush, comfort and baby-talk Bear after brutally murdering someone. “And it’s kind of hot as hell” - is what I’d say if I was a developmentally stunted weirdo who hadn’t made more than their fair share of mistakes with women.
If you think you’re into psychos, you probably aren’t, and if you’re really sure you’re into them, there is something wrong with you. You think you want her to drug you and have her way with you, and that way you are not responsible for the pleasure; you are absent, and as a violation your enjoyment of the act (if you even remember any of it) is annulled.
Either way, a fun little film that tells you why you should be careful what you wish for, and more importantly, don’t make wishes, make them come true yourself.
Remember, even when she had her fate chosen for her, Nikki still fought for what she wanted. Some would call that hubris, or the trope of ‘final girl’, but really, Nikki knew what she wanted and what she didn’t, where Bear knew vaguely for the former and nothing of the latter.