The “Abigail” and former “Scream” star leads the Sundance-selected feature “Your Monster,” which was written and directed by Caroline Lindy and based on her 2020 short film of the same name. Barrera plays Lindy’s stand-in Laura, an actress who is reeling after being dumped. She realizes that her rage actually manifested into a new beau, who just so happens to be a monster creature.
The official synopsis reads: “‘Your Monster’ tells the story of the soft-spoken actor Laura Franco (Barrera), who is dumped by her longtime boyfriend (Edmund Donovan) while recovering from surgery and retreats to her childhood home to recover. With her future looking bleak, insult is added to injury when Laura discovers her ex is staging a musical that she helped him develop. But out of these gut-wrenching life changes emerges a monster (Tommy Dewey) with whom she finds a connection, encouraging Laura to follow her dreams, open her heart, and fall in love with her inner rage.”
Meghann Fahy, Kayla Foster, Brandon Victor Dixon, Ike Ufomadu, and Lana Young also star.
The IndieWire review even credited Barrera and Dewey’s onscreen chemistry for “selling” to odd dynamic between the two lead characters.
“The monster is, of course, a manifestation of Laura’s rage, but he’s also — and you’re either gonna vibe with this or not, but we will say that Barrera and Dewey’s chemistry goes a long way to selling it — kind of a cutie?” the review reads. “As the rest of Laura’s life continues to curdle, Monster’s affection for her and his very genuine understanding of her character can’t help but warm her up, and the pair eventually fall into something like a rom-com. With teeth. (And musical numbers!).”
“As an actor, it really stretches you and takes you to crazy places that you don’t get to do in other genres, so it’s very appealing to me in that sense,” Barrera said of starring in horror features. “There’s something very seductive about the darkness in humans, and horror very adeptly explores all of that. I’ve gotten the joy and the good fortune of playing very interesting characters with lots of darkness within, and it’s just fun. It’s challenging, but it’s fun to get an audience to root for someone that is not all good.”
She continued, “I find it way more interesting to play a character that feels irredeemable on paper or like, ‘I hate her,’ and my challenge is, how do I make the audience still fall in love with her, not necessarily [make her] likable, because I feel like some of these characters that I’ve played are not necessarily likable, but they’re real. There’s something about them that you’ll be like, ‘Oh, I’m like that,’ or ‘My sister’s like that,’ or ‘My mother’s like that,’ just ‘I know someone that is like that.’ That immediately will make you establish a connection, even if what they’re doing is questionable.”
“Your Monster” premieres October 25 in theaters. Check out the trailer below.
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