Big Picture Big Sound

A person becomes a suspect in a criminal investigation when three important factors have been established: motive, means, and opportunity. "Spree" is the story of Kurt Kunkle, a highly-rated driver for a rideshare company named Spree who takes advantage of his job's unique nature as both the means and the opportunity to embark on a gruesome passenger killing "spree" (get it?). In terms of motive, Kurt's plan is to erase his embarrassing past decade of failed attempts to become an internet celebrity. By live-streaming murders as he commits them in his car, Kurt expects his actions to deliver the sizeable online audience he has always desired.

"Spree" cleverly reinvents the "found footage" horror film by replacing it with "live footage." The film's entire story is presented through online videos, streaming apps, cell phone video, body cam shots, and security footage. Director Eugene Kotlyarenko expertly uses these various points of view to continually engage and thrill the viewer at a broadband-level pace. The use of social media app screens with scrolling viewer comments and split screens provide simultaneous narratives and alternating points of view while avoiding coming across as gimmicky.

At first, "Spree" plays like a cultural satire, as the writers present victims who are not very sympathetic. For example, Kurt's first passenger is an unassumingly generic 40-something man who soon discloses that he is a key member of a white supremacist organization. After drinking one of the complimentary (poisoned) water bottles courteously provided by his Spree driver, the racist soon dies. Based on the film's logic, getting this guy off the planet is not a murder, but a societal benefit. Kurt's customers may not in reality be truly deserving of a death sentence, but in "Spree's" #darkcomedy world, the white supremacist, as well as an impatient d-bag bro guy, a condescending real estate agent, and a group of selfie-obsessed LA club-hopping trendsters, all get what they should deserve.

Kurt Kunkle is clearly presented as a complicated character, but those clues may be overlooked as viewers process all of the information and violence onscreen. Kurt's backstory is quickly presented via a montage of past videos during his version of a "marker drawing on a white board with narration" presentation. Besides seeing the years of effort that he's spent putting into his would-be celebrity brand, "Kurt's World," we learn of his parents' divorce, his disturbing memories of 9/11 news coverage, and an honest acknowledgement of his extreme loneliness. The rationale behind Kurt's justification for committing murder is not spoon-fed to us, so many viewers will interpret him as just a horror movie character who kills people because that is what characters do in a horror movie. But, there is more here than meets the eye. #lookforit

Soon, Kurt's destinations are no longer determined by his passengers. Instead, serendipity, chance, fate, etc., provide a direction to potentially meeting his objective, and the same forces also ensure that each stop ends with a grim and tragic result. As tension increases, so does the simultaneous visual presentation of online viewers reacting to and eventually provoking the deeds of the streamers. Underpinning this all are the distinctive performances by Joe Keery (Stranger Things) as Kurt, and Sasheer Zamata (Saturday Night Live) as social media savvy comedian Jessie Adams. Unlike a vacuous and ego-driven livestream presentation, their performances maintain an energy long after the cameras are off.

Similarly, "Spree" doesn't stop when it seems like the action is over. It delivers an impactful and intelligently constructed post-script with a message that is powerful and clear: once the internet gives you life you can live there forever...for better, and for worse.