Alien Appeal

A heterosexual young woman and her male, gay roommate are both ensnared by the sexual magnetism of an alien guru in 2026's Touch Me. I respect the hell out of this film's conceptual boldness. I'm not sure why it doesn't quite come to life. Maybe it could've used a script polish by someone with more of an ear for dialogue. But there are still reasons to watch this movie.

Top of the list, as far as I'm concerned, is Olivia Taylor Dudley, who plays the young woman, Joey. Though she's somehow 40 now. How can she be 40? She was my favourite one on The Magicians, which I still think of as one of those shows for the young people, but it did premiere 11 years ago. She still looks fantastic. Maybe that's why she did nude scenes for this movie. I remember when I saw The Magicians' cast at Comic-Con, on a panel, one nervous young man asked her a question and the host said, "Aw, she's on your phone's wallpaper, isn't she?" The young man blushed and admitted she was. I wonder if he was excited to see Touch Me. I know I was, once I realised she was in it, which I didn't until I started watching. The movie begins with her giving a monologue in a continuous shot that lasts a few minutes, telling her therapist about her bad relationship with an alien. And she's really good.

She and her roommate, Craig (Jordan Gavaris), are starting to get on each other's nerves due to some financial tensions. Then Brian (Lou Taylor Pucci) invites them both to his lavish, post-modern home and proceeds to seduce them both. In the sex scenes, Brian becomes a giant tentacle monster.

A lot of the movie consists of confessional scenes in which one of the three characters opens up to the others about feeling betrayed or wanting to betray the others or wanting to make love to the others. Some of it gets a little tedious but maybe it's just because this kind of thing is just not personally to my taste.

I wish the special effects had been just a little better. Some characters get their hands bitten off but the actors clearly still have their hands afterwards, they're clearly just making fists with a little putty spread over them. I know the movie's low budget. Maybe they should've lost body parts that could've been more easily concealed by clothing or camera angles.

I love that films like this can get made now, in which filmmakers can explore an unusual vision. This one was written and directed by Addison Heimann.

Touch Me is available on Shudder.