A dark and surreal alchemical tale of identity from Knives & Skin director Jennifer Reeder.
Jonny (Kiah McKirnan) is a troubled teen who is taken under custody by her aunt Hildie (Alicia Silverstone) and sent to a strict private school. Much like any teenage girl, she undergoes a bodily transformation. Much unlike any teenage girl, her metamorphosis has to do with a witchy hyper-empathy superpower.
This is Jennifer Reeder’s second exploration of female teenagehood through the lens of the feminist horror genre, with the help of a wildly talented up and coming cast as well as the brilliantly stern and ageless Alicia Silverstone - her own teenager-self filmography comes to mind, notably the underrated horror The Crush (1993). Reeder delivers a daring and smart satire on the “becoming a woman” metaphor, that’s “ferocious, repulsive, magnificent”. With its mysterious crime/abduction plot, Perpetrator takes us along a trippy ride with dark humour undertones, a dash of body horror, and quite a lot of delicious gore.
