Antisocial (I) (2013) User Reviews

B Movie but watchable

[jim-man · 5/10 · 17 January 2014]

A satire like Dead Set.

Apparently, a social media site uses subliminal to draw members back. Unfortunately, that program mutates into a virus that affects human brains. Turning people delusional and violence. To the point where a tumour grows and some heads explode.

Lots' of frights and gore. As usual, the survivors barricade themselves in a house and fall one by one. As the survivors frantically check the social site for news, they are infected too.

Decent acting and pace. Not to be taken seriously like Walking Dead. Just enjoy the creepiness and horror.

Sub-par suburban Canadian horror

[forgetful_man · 3/10 · 9 November 2014]

Twenty minutes in, I decided to go clean my kitchen instead. That should give you a good idea of how good this movie is.

Let's use the "things I learned" motif:

Balcony railings collapse no matter what force is applied.

A body in motion tends to stay in motion unless you are the good guy.

Barricading a house necessitates a montage.

Livestreaming vloggers stay on line until someone sends a video chat. Go ahead. You are undoubtedly the first one to think to do this.

Never trust a guy named Chad. Even if he is Canadian. Especially if he is Canadian

A glass sliding door will only ever be used once as a means of entry.

A person choking next to you should never distract you from web-surfing.

Christmas tree lights are remarkably strong.

College students don't swear nearly as much as you remember.

It's really hard to tell the difference between the aftermath of a really good New Year's Eve party, and a home invasion.

I don't have any quibbles with the fictional cause of the outbreak, its effects or its treatment. We long ago gave up on any sort of logic about those things in these types of movies.

It is hard however, very hard, perhaps even impossible, to make your protagonist both adorable and bad-ass. But I'll be damned if they don't try.

Worth watching on streaming network while isolated in your house.

[moorek · 5/10 · 24 April 2020]

I actually didn't realize it was a 2013 film until I came to IMDb. I wanted something fairly quick to watch and picked this. It is not especially good in most ways but it kept me watching for the duration.

PLOT. We need to forget plot as we do for most horror and zombie movies. The cause behind the disease is foolish. People want to think of it as a social commentary but it really isn't. Have to accept that it does not make sense. Having said that, it is no worse than the plot behind THE CELL by Stephen King.

PACING. It is slow at spots although it does start out fairly quickly. In the first 5 minutes or so we see someone coming down with early symptoms. There are the many normal zombie tropes and jump scares like breaking in through a door or window to keep us watching.

ACTORS/ACTING. I really didn't recognize any of the actors which I liked. One looks familiar and I've likely seen him in minor roles. Most of them are okay but not great. The main female lead is dull most of the time. This was her first performance and she's gone on to do other things but this one is not great. Yet I found her, until the final basement scene, to be very typically normal.

LOCATIONS. Most of it takes place in a house set but some of the outside and university scenes were not common, very grey and interesting. Did not feel like New Year's Eve especially as it was filmed in Ontario.

ENDING. The very end was disappointing. After realizing that there was a time period when infected people all died; you only had to wait it out and then rebuild the world. You'd likely have some lower infection rates but eventually the human race would try to recover in a world full of dead bodies. That would have been an interesting sequel. But they decided to go full zombie at the end and have most if not all come back to life - even those that died that were not dead from the disease. There is a sequel but the plot doesn't sound like is how humans survived.

Overall it was a low budget and just moderately acted movie with a normal plot and the occasional small plot point that caught your attention. Worth a bowl of popcorn as you binge watch everything you can find.

How to create a bad movie from a good idea

[mrpeter96 · 4/10 · 15 February 2017]

I love movies in which the characters are locked up with each other in a small place. If it is a horror it's another positive point. This movie has both advantages, and even its basic idea is great: people go crazy from social media exposure. Yet the filmmakers managed to create a bad trash horror from it.

In my opinion the first two thirds of the movie are great. In the beginning we see how friends have a party, but then strange things happen in the outside world. We can observe it like they do: trough the TV and the internet. The actors are not good but they deliver their play adequate. The characters reactions to the events are fairly logical and understandable, but they can be a little annoying. This part of the movie is so far so good. Avarege horror performance with a few interesting tweaks.

But then the movie begins to turn into the terrible horror cliché trash I mentioned before. In the beginning I thought: Hm that's interesting. People are mentally 'infected' from a social media website bug and are going crazy. This is a good idea! Then the filmmakers decided to reveal the stupidest plot twist I have seen in my life: from the website a worm or nerve or I don't even know what kind of tumor started to grow in the people and this thing makes them a kind of zombie for a time and then they die. Then to further push the movie into a deep casm of stupidness the main character drills a hole in her own head to remove it, and of course survives.

Here I think I have seen everything bad this movie could deliver, but no no no.. Our hero leaves the apartment and we see all the people died from the tumor lying in the streets. Then just before the movie ends every dead person stands up because they became undead.

I don't advise you to watch this movie. Only if you want to have a tumor developed in your brain like the people in this bad trash movie.

To put it in internet slang: epic fail

[Coventry · 2/10 · 1 November 2013]

Luckily enough it rarely ever happens to me, but "Antisocial" was a film where I just had to leave the theater before it was finished… The dumb and derivative plot, the insufferable characters and – most importantly – the indescribable boredom that I miraculously struggled myself through for about three quarters of the running time just became too unendurable towards the ending. I like to consider myself as a patient and tolerant horror fanatic, but this was one of the single worst movies that I ever watched at a festival. The plot is a blatant imitation of "The Signal", in which a signal broadcast through communication devices like TV-sets and mobile telephones turns people into insane, emotionless and unstoppable killing machines. "Antisocial" replaces this signal with a subliminal message spread through a social media website (they call it Social Redroom, but it's clearly aimed at Facebook) that turns its users into aggressive zombies. The victims, all internet addicts that even spend the New Year's celebration with the phones and laptops in their hands, first suffer from bizarre hallucinations and subsequently start bleeding from their nose and ears. Perhaps in the hands of an experienced and talented director, the story could have resulted in a realistically tense and paranoid apocalyptic horror tale, but debuting director Cody Calahan erroneously focuses too much on the five (completely uninteresting) main characters and the intrigues between them. There are far too many dull, meaningless and repetitive dialogs in the screenplay, while the "action" sequences are tame and brief. It's really hard to explain how boring "Antisocial" is and how badly I hoped for all the protagonists to suffer quick and painful deaths. The morality lesson, spend more real time with your friends instead of from behind a social media profile, is quite laughable and pathetic. Like they say on the internet: epic fail

Very disappointing

[dbowleysmith · 3/10 · 11 June 2015]

This movie is a blatant rider of the "Zombie Outbreak" bandwagon of the early 2010's. Like so many Zombie movies released during this period Antisocial lacks the substance and heart of those old B-grade flicks making it fell more like a money grab than anything.

The premise regarding the cause of the infection (which is my personal favorite part of Zombie movies) is so nonsensical and unscientific that I just cant take this movie seriously.Not to say it didn't have its good parts, however these are few and far between. Any true lover of zombie movies will be truly disappointed.

Seriously if you have the 90 mins it takes to watch this movie, you're better of attempting to perform backyard brain-surgery on yourself with a power-drill.

How can a film with this much potential be this bad? You had to actually try- that's how

[boydapeters · 4/10 · 1 April 2018]

Premise was good but started nonsensically slow for no reason. the breakdown moment was pretty ordinary, you could see that this was going to be an inside type film . ok so needed to be good in suspense but you could see how bad the acting was and you thought why did they choose why did they cast -these awful people who you had no interest in and who are such bad actors and then 10 minutes later you realise that they're just given awful Direction, dialogue and acting instructions. So much potential wasted it's the kind of thing I wish someone else did because they would have done 10 times better 3.5 could have so very easily been 7

Putting it mildly

[kosmasp · 4/10 · 4 December 2013]

Bad social media! Well that's sort of the message. And if you will the central thing the movie is saying is: Get out more, be nice in "real" life. Which is not a bad thing in my book. Unfortunately it does fall into almost every cliché on its way to deliver that message. And while the cliché of the "beautiful" people (on screen) is not something I'd complain about, there are others I do.

The actors are trying their best and there is a sense of urgency and it does have more than a little bit of tension in it. So there is something to the movie other than the general idea, that might hold you to watching it. It's not much, but maybe enough for your viewing pleasure.

Not bad.

[mvike · 6/10 · 28 November 2019]

Whenever I see a horror movie on IMDb rated between 4.0 - 4.5 I can be sure it's going to be fairly decent budget at least, as even the best horror usually doesn't crack 7+.

This isn't the most original story ever, but as far as "zombie" flick, you gotta give it some credit for not being the exact same as 99% of zombie films.

The story itself is just okay, but enough to keep you watching. 6/10

The budget was solid. No iPhone 4s filming. 8/10

Acting...it was fine. 6/10

Overall it kept me entertained and if someone brought up the film, I'd remember it more fondly than negatively. Take that for what it's worth. Also, I think this was much better than the sequel.

Terrible, just terrible waste

[GTeixeira · 1/10 · 6 February 2014]

A group of university friends make a party to celebrate the New Year. However, a strange epidemic of violence erupts all around the world, apparently related to social networks, and they are forced to fight for survival as everything goes mad around them.

It sounds good, it feels good. My thoughts, as I first read about this film and started watching it, was that this could be like a 'Pontypool' type of zombie/outbreak film mixed with 'Pulse's technology based horror. A try at social commentary, which could work well with this horror style.

Well, I guess I shouldn't have been expecting an intelligent horror. The comparison to 'Pulse', rather than the much better and original 'Kairo', was the only of my expectations to be met.

The whole 'social network zombies' concept the film seemed aimed for (and some reviewers seemed to believe make it deep and original) ends up as nothing but a half-assed excuse to indulge on the usual horror clichés (in special, the zombie ones). Weak, drowzy acting cast performing stereotyped or disengaging characters prone to stupid and nonsensical decisions, together with a complete disregard for logic on the plot development or even in basic research (the way the 'virus' spreads... seriously?).

The set-up is relatively promising, and the concept could be developed nicely. A problem most modern horror makers do is believing everything needs to be fast-paced; 'Antisocial' ends up moving so fast it rushes through the good parts of the concept. Rather than doing like 'Invasion of Body Snatchers' or 'The Thing' and building up the suspense, playing with the whole paranoia situation the film could easily create, they instead rush through for the zombie gore and Resident Evil-like 'action girl fights zombies' 'action'.

As it turns out, the conflict and the tension are far too phony to work, the characters are both moronic and cannot bring the audience to care about them, and the only thing this whole film offers is the usual clichés rather than something new.

Some reviewers here are trying to defend the film with the 'argument' that it pretty much 'tries to be socially engaged, exploring new themes for an horror'. It is not exploring or engaged at all; it is just the same old with a half-assed excuse to try and hide the film's shallowness. Trying something new is good, but if you do so like 'Antisocial' it is better not to try at all.

Surgery buffs will get a kick out of this nonsense.

[fedor8 · 10 December 2019]

Any surgeons out there? You guys and girls will especially "enjoy" this nonsense. You will be like Mike and the robots from MST3K doing a running commentary, and that goes for the grand finale in which the main characters attempt to engage in DYI cranial surgery. Without anesthesia. Without sterilized instruments. This absurd premise is pushed so far that the main female protagonist (who is amazingly stupid) drills a hole into her own head, while standing, and without any pain-killers. She then places a handkerchief over the wound (kinda like bringing a hammer and nail into the orbit to fix a NASA shuttle) and then goes into fight mode vs the zombies. A scene so dumb I could swear Stephen King had written it and Argento directed it. With De Palma acting as adviser.

The characters do everything to make their own extermination as easy as possible. There is certain logic in panic-stricken people making wrong decisions, but these five just do and say way too many dumb things. For example, the curly hair guy keeps touching everybody despite being told that a major infection has taken over.

That main female character comes off as a moron who just sits there and stares at walls, pondering what to do after the realization that she's pregnant. As if the viewers give a hoot about her pregnancy. Apocalypse or pregnancy? Yes, I'd say the former wins.

What gets the movie some points is the somewhat original premise of a Facebook-like evil conglomerate causing the zombie plague by lobotomizing their viewers to use the site more. That explains why the symptoms are nearly exactly the same from person to person. Sure, it's a bit reminiscent of "Pulse" or "Pontypool" and a few other films but it's not reminiscent of 1000 movies - at least as far as the explanation is concerned. As for the zombies, they're stereotypical fare mostly.

Michelle Mylett, the one who drills a hole into her own head, is unfortunately a symptom of our dumb, twisted age: an anorexic actress whose arms are as thin as my fingers. How the hell does a mentally-ill approach to diet become the social norm - and a sexy look! Naturally, she's flat-chested as well, because there seems to be a conspiracy in American show-biz as of late that no chesty women are allowed into movies or TV. This is very obvious and blatant discrimination and I'm amazed that nobody seems to have picked up on it - especially large-breasted women who should feel annoyed and disrespected by it.

Inspiring Ending

[ahao76 · 9/10 · 6 May 2016]

I kind of like this movie.. Maybe a bit slow start but it gets better.. I love the ending so much when the 2nd wave of the infected occurred. And the music really excite me a lot.. Its like my heart goes out there with the female lead too until the credits comes up.. I intend to give 7 stars at first. But i really really love the ending part so much.. I give additional of another 2 stars.. Thanks to all the people who involve in making this movie. I don't know about the others but the movie sure captured my feelings at the end part.. For those who does not like the movie, just too bad.. I hope there are people who appreciates this movie like i did.. Cheers..

Clever

[gavin6942 · 6/10 · 28 October 2014]

Five university friends gather at a house party to ring in the New Year. Unbeknownst to them, an epidemic has erupted outside, causing outbreaks around the world.

Scott Weinberg of Fearnet says, "If you can get past the fact that the flick is composed of 75% recycled ideas and 25% new ones, you may find that something to like." Sounds to me like Weinberg does not understand how the horror genre works -- few movies today have less than 75% recycled ideas. Why gripe about this one?

Indeed, this was an interesting satire and attack on social media. Silly, maybe, and certainly nothing that can be taken too seriously. But not the terrible film critics (especially Rotten Tomatoes) makes it out to be. When compared to the technology-themed "The Den", this is the more mature and accomplished approach to the Internet Age.

Terrible, awful script.

[xaxa-52-553031 · 2/10 · 12 July 2014]

This movie comes to me as the project of two rich young cinematography students that while sharing a beer come up with a script in like 15 minutes. Underdeveloped plot, underdeveloped characters, pointless dialogs and censored gore to save it for the ladies. Terrible, terrible movie.

If you're studying cinematography you may want to see this movie to appreciate the technical aspects of filming (to some extent).

If you're an actor, you may want to see this movie because if there is anything that saved this movie from being total garbage is the effort the actors put to keep up with the script and not falling flat to the floor while pulling their hairs off out of shame.

Awful script. Decent direction. Decent acting.

Social media will be the end of the world

[Ocrisia · 4/10 · 10 April 2014]

By half an hour in, I was wondering who possibly could watch this movie and not want to throw something at the screen. I read about the movie and it said a bunch of college students are holed up in their house while crazy events happen around them. That's not what happens, really, it's just a bunch of students holed up in a house while a virus spreads making everyone act like zombies. I didn't realize it was an almost zombie movie, and I'm pretty tired of zombies, I don't find them scary and I think they're played out. But every once in a while I'll see a zombie movie I like, so I stuck it out. They're not actually zombies though, they're not dead, they're just sick, and violent. For some reason the news in the movie says it's a biological terror attack, but in reality it's a virus spread by social media. Seriously. It comes through the cell phones of people messing around on "the social redroom" (facebook.) So there's that. Forget that it's literally impossible to spread a virus (a biological one) through a computer or a cell phone. It's like a computer virus that spreads to people if they spend too much time on social networking sites. This is explained at the end of the movie, which helps a little, but not really. The people in the movie don't realize how it spreads yet. They're all at a new year's party and a few of them spend most of the time with their friends on their phones or laptop. A bit of the movie we watch takes place on a screen on the screen. Then there's one guy who keeps saying "we don't know if he's infected" about 1) a friend of theirs who shows up at their door demanding to be let in with his nose and ears bleeding (the signs everyone says to watch for). He still wants to let him in, because "we don't know if that's what he has." Really? Then his friend who is in the house tells him he's sick, and says he has the symptoms, and he says it again. "We don't know if that's what you have." But then, when the girl in the house pukes, he thinks she has it. The one person with symptoms that don't fit the virus is the one person he assumes has it. This guy, by the way, is a medical undergrad student. There are some kind of interesting ideas, like when the dead die they basically become like computers themselves, or phones. I just can't get past the idea that if you look at a screen too much you will get a biological virus, because..no. The explanation is (SPOILER) that the site, and the infected, make your brain grow too big for your head. Even with that though, I probably would have enjoyed it more if the actors didn't act like such morons. They do in a lot of horror movies, but these guys are too dumb. And the ending doesn't really make sense, though I kind of liked it.

Meh

[flurbinflarbin · 3/10 · 31 December 2019]

Boring, and no character development equal a movie that's super boring where I don't care about the characters... Did all these actors go to the Kristen Stewart school of acting?

An Outbreak movie that makes a stab at social satire

[smokingtyger · 5/10 · 14 January 2019]

I watch a lot of Sci-fi movies and the harsh reviews for this movie surprise me. Sure, it's kinda low budget and totally derivative but it deserves better than a 2 or 3!

Pathetic

[drainblut · 1/10 · 26 January 2015]

Another day, another terrible zombie movie, if it can so be called. This one attempts to separate itself from the crowd by using a social network(called "Social Red Room") as a deep seeded backbone for the movie. Everyone in the movie is using it, and that's apparently all they use, as shown in literally every scene in the movie. It's outgrown Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Twitch, Steam, along with any dating site or official news site(Surely you've heard of it?). We then have a zombie outbreak and it's incredibly obvious from the start that this 1 network everyone in the world uses is connected to it. It's painful how obvious this is, when it could have been much less obvious if it wasn't forced into every scene down your throat. You're literally watching a movie in which every scene someone accesses or uses this network. You won't go 10 seconds without seeing it pulled up on a phone or laptop to do something. This movie strangles you to such an excessive degree with this social network every scene that you should see their "clever plot twist" coming from a mile away. Trust me however, it's not logical in any way, and you only feel insulted once the movie confirms what you were already hoping WASN'T going to be the "twist" because it was just too stupid and too predictable.

Ignoring the Social Red Room, what you're left with is a terrible zombie movie where you'll care about no character, have no investment in anyone or anything, and will probably forget about an hour after viewing. Some of the acting is terrible, but that's the least of the movie's problems. You just have no interesting characters or plot to make you care about this movie or anything in it.

Seriously, watch Remains or State of Emergency(both 2011) instead. Those are GOOD zombie movies in recent years you probably haven't heard of. But this one? Antisocial? Stay far away. It's a movie made to send a message against social networks, but done by people who had no idea when or how to do that, nor how to make the movie they shoved it into.

Horrible! Extremely stupid!!!

[tundra87 · 1/10 · 2 January 2014]

This movie was BAD!!! The actors were SO horrible that it made me and my sister laugh our lungs out! Seriously, I haven't seen before THAT bad actors and actresses! But Anyway, there was nothing new in this movie, it just made me yawn and my head hurt (probably because of the so called "actors"....) The movie Tried really hard to be scary, but it failed miserably. There was NOTHING scary in this movie, it was comical and awkward. But I can recommend this piece of hazel nut if you wan't to laugh like hell :D Or you can give it to your worst enemy because it will make him/her head explode :D But It WAS kind of entertaining to watch the "actors" "performances" :D

It's worth a Watch

[joy-jsmith · 7/10 · 2 January 2014]

I really don't get a reason to see such a low rating becoz this movie is definite worth a watch if you are into zombie or outbreak stuff.the idea was great and the treatment was different for a change.the story grips you in the middle but bit luck-warm at the beginning and bit at the end.the acting just was there but misses the spark a bit.music is good and camera work is OK too.I think a good 15 min can be cut off from it's entire length but overall it's a different and very innovative movie,yes it's not an excellent or mind blowing one but it will not disappoint you either.

If you have some free time in your hand and want to enjoy a decent and new idea film then it's for you but as I said don't expect an Oscar winning story just be with it and you may end up liking it.

Social Media will cause the apocalypse and fire is bad

[nottoohappyaboutthis · 4/10 · 22 November 2015]

Seriously, that's the plot.

This film rewards itself in making a deep message about how social media is apparently ruining our society....through a zombie movie. I didn't realize it until the twist was explained to me, but the movie constantly makes references to teenagers and social media; the news makes several prompts in passing about how kids went on a killing spree due to cyberbullying, one of the main characters asks another how she keeps connected and she smugly replies "I ACTUALLY meet up with them", the female lead is suddenly protected from the virus due to the fact that she deleted her account (despite the fact that the virus spread through having one in the first place).

I get that being on your phone so much that you're ignoring people, or not going out, is probably a sign that perhaps you shouldn't be online so frequently. But the setting here is at a party, with the main characters dancing, drinking, even having sex, with the exception that one of them wanted a group photo. Remember, kids, don't take selfies or you're dooming the world and your head is going to explode.

Besides the awfully dramatic personal opinion about people and computers, the acting is something akin to what you'd see in soap opera's. The characters aren't dislikable, but they aren't exactly likable either, as they're all incredibly bland and have no defining character traits.

IMDb reviewers need to lighten up... It's a FUN film to watch!

[ihearthorrorfilm · 7/10 · 29 December 2013]

A Canadian thriller/horror film that plays with the idea of social media spreading a deadly virus. 5 friends get together for a new years eve party but plans change when news of violence and murder spreads like wild fire around their city. I would be lying if I didn't tell you how much fun I had watching this unoriginal, over-done type film, but I did. Even though this style of film has been done a million times over, when its done with quality tools, it's still just as entertaining as the rest. This one gets bonus points for having a really awesome musical score as well as an ending that forced me to remember the thing I loved most about 'Prometheus' (DIY abortion vs. DIY lobotomy). I also have to point out the slight guilt I felt in regards to the subject of social media in conjunction with human addiction and it's vulnerability to mind control. I like to think in my mind that I'm intellectually above the addiction of social media and yet, here I am! Any film that pokes at me and makes me feel like the very thing I think I'm not, gets an A+ in my book… Anyhoo, Antisocial is a fun zombie-esque type film that is both delightfully entertaining and gory. It's not an amazing film, but it is definitely worth your time if you enjoy end-of-the-world themed films. And again, bonus points for the kick ass music throughout!

Low rent zombie hijinks

[Leofwine_draca · 3/10 · 9 February 2018]

ANTISOCIAL is an indie horror flick from Canada with a little more promise than most, but only a little, mind. The story is about a gathering of friends for New Year who end up being besieged thanks to a pesky zombie outbreak. Much of the communication with the outside world comes from social media. There are some solid but all-too-brief suspense scenes while the acting is of an okay standard, but the story is too drawn out with little incident. The annoying blue filter and slightly lacklustre ending don't help matters either. A sequel followed.

It's OK

[epiceffectss · 5/10 · 19 December 2014]

Another zombie type film . Medium to low budget , looks OK , and all the camera work is fine , easy to watch , which sometimes these zombie flicks are just appalling this one is OK. The story is a little diff to your usual zombie flick which keeps it interesting but it's not amazing. Hence I gave it five out of ten. There are worse films out there so if your bored its OK entertainment. The actors are all OK , semi pro , nothing to moan about there . Soundtrack is OK , not amazing in my opinion. I watched it and it kept my attention , now it's over I don't have an epic zombie film to think over. Would I recommend it ? Only if your someone like me who's seen everything and needs more zombie food . There's better out there but there's also worse zombie flicks out there , worth a watch if you can't find anything else to watch , but if you want a great zombie flick you wanna watch dawn of the dead.

Internet video for DYI brain surgery? Count me in!

[nemanjab993 · 1/10 · 2 September 2020]

What a hot mess. This movie is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. Acting is horrible, and plot is absolutely hilarious. It should have been dubbed Horror comedy. From random busting of boarded window in order to be snatched by zombies, to doing brain surgery to yourself in order to remove tumor using internet video, this movie is a hot mess. Oh yeah, and there's also a premise that computer program can cause biological viruses.