“Lurker” is a good, nifty, and unsettling little parable of the pathology of fame in our time. It tells the story of Matthew (Théodore Pellerin), a no one who works in a type of bare-bones L.A. clothes boutiques, and the way he insinuates himself into the inside circle of Oliver (Archie Madekwe), a budding pop star who has legions of screaming followers however is attempting to leap to the following stage. (He nonetheless rides round in a tour bus.) Matthew turns into Oliver’s bro, his hanger-on, his social-media digital camera buddy. And Matthew is grateful for the eye — so grateful, the truth is, that he’ll do something, and cease at nothing, to maintain it coming.
Thirty years in the past, a premise like this one may need been the gasoline for a traditional Hollywood thriller. However Alex Russell, the writer-director of “Lurker,” works with a extremely achieved jittery cell-phone-camera aesthetic that makes all the film a mirror of what it’s about: the fleeting I-shoot-a-video-of-myself-therefore-I-am superstar that’s turn into the coin of the realm within the Instagram period. Everybody within the film is jockeying to be cool, to be extra inside than thou, to be anointed by Oliver, and due to this fact to share within the privileged aura of his fame mystique. But it surely’s like a citadel within the air of aspiration constructed on nothing however itself.
That will sound a bit facile, however the real grip of “Lurker” begins with Matthew, who as performed by Théodore Pellerin emerges as a personality of startlingly refined and unnerving calculation. At first we predict he’s only a geek, as a result of that’s how he presents himself: too awkward to be something however honest, with a toothy huge grin and bird-like eyes that stare like lasers. (He drives a motorbike as an alternative of a automotive, and lives together with his grandmother.) However he’s a fairly handsome geek, and he is aware of the right way to do the handshakes and play the video video games and drop the “yos” and “bros” in the correct place. The extra we see him function, the extra these eyes of his turn into a examine in backstabbing suspense. He’s obtained a contact of Norman Bates, together with a beatific passive-aggression that jogs my memory of the good efficiency Mike White gave as a stalker in “Chuck & Buck.” Matthew is a geek enjoying a geek, and people orbs of his take the whole lot in.
He’s working on the clothes retailer when the tall, British, biracial Oliver, together with his signature two-tone hair (crimson on prime, darkish on the edges), wanders in to browse. He’s been there earlier than, and Matthew instantly packages “My Love Track for You” on the speaker system — a phenomenal observe off Nile Rogers’ 1983 solo album. He is aware of that it’s one in every of Oliver’s deep-cut faves, and that it’s going to due to this fact make him appear to be the last word Oliver connoisseur to play it. Positive sufficient, it catches Oliver’s consideration, and Oliver comes up and appreciates the hell out of him. He asks Matthew to come back to that night time’s present, and even takes his quantity in order that he can cross him backstage.
When Matthew arrives within the dressing room, what he sees isn’t what he was anticipating: Oliver sitting round with a girlfriend and the 2 members of his entourage (who he’s recognized since center faculty), and nobody may care much less about Matthew, besides to razz him (he’s casually requested to take his pants down). However that’s as a result of he isn’t on the within but; this scene is sort of a hazing ceremony, which he passes. So Oliver asks him to come back over to his home within the Hollywood Hills. He has instructed Matthew to convey alongside his old-school camcorder, as a result of he desires Matthew to doc him — to assist with the documentary Oliver is making about himself, and to provide you with social-media-ready riffs.
Oliver, like every pop star on the rise, desires to publicize himself, however not that way back this kind of factor would have been dealt with by the document firm, and the publicists who work for it. Fame is now extra self-generated, and so it virtually doesn’t matter if Matthew, behind the digital camera, has expertise (although he does). All the pieces they’re taking pictures is disposable: pranks, vérité fan service, no matter will seize folks’s consideration.
Tellingly, we see Oliver and Matthew play a mutual sport of pretend admiration. Oliver tells his new bro that he’s particular (as a result of Matthew understands him), and that he could be his greatest buddy; however we are able to inform that Oliver, even at his most ardent, simply says no matter pops into his head. He can afford to not have his phrases imply something. And what he desires from Matthew is the form of flattery that may stoke him. “I feel you’re going to be the most important artist on this planet,” says Matthew, sounding like he means it. That’s the form of remark that hits the candy spot. Archie Madekwe, from “Saltburn,” infuses Oliver with an exquisitely genuine vibe of walking-on-air camaraderie that’s at all times there…for a value. Which is why it’s all so fickle.
Oliver, from a damaged background, says that the folks round him are household — and that now he has the facility to decide on his circle of relatives. That’s one in every of themes of the movie: that the makeshift cults of worship on social media, and in superstar entourages, have turn into substitute households, which is one purpose they’re so addictive. And Matthew is nothing lower than an addict for Oliver’s admiration; he’s hooked on his new place on this planet. Due to Oliver, Matthew’s Instagram account blows up with followers; instantly, he’s a “superstar” too. It’s all taking place, spiraling ahead of its personal accord — at the least, till they’re taking pictures a video for one in every of Oliver’s songs with sheep in a barnyard, and the official documentary dude (Daniel Zolghardri) who Matthew has been working with runs out of digital camera juice and instantly can’t discover his spare batteries. Uh-oh! We now have a fairly good concept who took them.
There’s a digital-age “All About Eve” facet to “Lurker.” When Jamie (Sunny Suljic), Matthew’s comrade from the clothes retailer, finds himself being tapped by Oliver for his hand-crafted sweaters (instantly, he’s hanging out on the home too), the best way Matthew registers the menace to his personal ascendance is chilling. He thought he was the particular one, the star bro. He doesn’t need to share the love. Even when Oliver, after the group’s journey to London, begins to determine that Matthew is hassle and freezes him out, it gained’t finish there. Matthew has arrange a surveillance digital camera in Oliver’s lounge, and when two keen younger Oliver followers come as much as him within the boutique, he is aware of simply the right way to make use of them for functions of blackmail.
“Lurker,” as you’ll have gathered (and as its title tells you), shouldn’t be a warm-and-fuzzy expertise. The film is advised virtually totally from Matthew’s point-of-view, which you’d suppose, in that amoral manner that cinema has, may make us take a perverse pleasure in rooting for him to succeed. However Alex Russell’s anthropological perspective is cooler and extra indifferent than that. He doesn’t fairly make Matthew into his scoundrel hero. He’s much more occupied with having us drink in the entire debased circus of fame-whore spectacle that pop superstar is turning into.
