The Reel Review
A teenage runaway struggling with insomnia and sleep terrors signs up for a sleep study. Initially it seems like the perfect solution to learn the cause of her nightmares and have a place other than a playground to sleep. But it quickly manifests itself into something surreal and sinister, in this psychological sci-fi/horror.
Come True writer/director/cinematographer Anthony Scott Burns starts off his promising saga with an interesting premise, a chilling score and LOTS of trippy dream sequence visuals. The movie has a dreary, eerie vibe reminiscent of 1970s and early 80s low budget horror classics like Phantasm and Scanners. It also has a compelling lead – a charismatic Julia Sarah Stone – as the frustrated, sleep-deprived teen trying to make sense of what is happening to her. Even Burns’ dim, washed out cinematography captures the bleakness of a life lived under constant exhaustion.
But what Burns doesn’t have is a clear, coherent story. As soon as he introduces the character Jeremy (Landon Liboiron), the sleep study director who looks like a mashup of Daniel Radcliffe and Jared Leto, the story gets weird and confusing, and not in a good way. Jeremy lets Sarah in on what is REALLY happening at the sleep study. But after a half hour of dead end storylines and throwaway characters, there is an infuriating, out of left field ending that will make you regret having wasted nearly two hours on such bait and switch nonsense.
REEL FACTS
• Vancouver native Julia Sarah Stone also stars in the 2018 drama Honey Bee, about a teenage truck stop prostitute who ends up in a foster home on a farm in remote Northern Ontario.
• Come True is writer/director Anthony Scott Burns’ second feature film. His first is the 2018 horror, Our House.
• Come True was filmed in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
Video & Photo
