Big Baby (Frightfest 2026)

The tagline for SCREAM warns that ‘Someone has taken their love of scary movies one step too far’. With BIG BABY, the love for scary movies is clear from the filmmaker, while the participation of the protagonist in the genre is what goes too far. Despite this apparent convolution, BIG BABY is more knowing, more intriguing and more scarily fractious than you might expect. 

The protagonist here is screenwriter Adam Lewis (Brandon Scott), introduced in a long shot that steadily tracks away from him as he listens to a podcast on which Vampire Greg (Jordan Elsass) and Steve Strange (Radek Lord) tear apart his latest film, a scene that gives the film contemporary resonance (but might also cause it to date quickly). This long take proves typical of writer-director Spider One’s visual style, which combines close attention to detail, sustained menace, rapidly edited set pieces and precisely used cuts to black. These could be jarring but, within the context of this film, those jars are effective. The director also delivers well-paced dialogue sequences between Adam and his partner Kate (Krsy Fox, who also edits) as well as his friend James (Torio Von Grol), as well as allowing Scott the space to express Adam’s increasingly distressed state. 

And Adam has good reason to be distressed. After the opening scene where he gets very angry at the podcast of Greg and Steve, he starts having dreams, and then possibly more than dreams, about a killer with the moniker and visage of Big Baby. Before you can say Kevin Williamson, he is typing away at a new screenplay, but the events that he writes are not strictly confined to his hard drive. 

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Metahorror has shown its potential and drawbacks over the years, from THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW and FRIGHT NIGHT to WES CRAVEN’S NEW NIGHTMARE, BEHIND THE MASK: THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON and the more recent THE CABIN IN THE WOODS, as well as the entire SCREAM franchise. When it works, it provides enjoyment for the general fan and winks for the aficionado. When the drawbacks take over, it becomes a conveyor belt of references that overpower the plot. BIG BABY is a brilliant capitalisation on the potential of this conceit, as rather than making overt nods, the characters acknowledge their own awareness while references are carefully framed. James wears a shirt decorated with sharks, that could be a reference to JAWS but still works for his character; a character named Amanda resonates intertextually with SAW; a shopkeeper bears a resemblance to John Carpenter and a hulking figure tilts his head in a way reminiscent of Michael Myers; the brilliant art design by Dakota Fox features unsettling faces in the background as well as a bat, clocks and mysterious looking candlesticks in the bookcase behind where Adam works. The most effective framing comes from the scenes in Adam’s screenplay, presented as horror set pieces which they are both for the film and the film within a film, complete with directions such as ‘EXT: KENNY (Mid 30s) and JULIA (mid 30s) exit the bar’, ‘KENNY is DEAD’ and ‘FADE TO MOTHER FUCKING BLACK’. 

Yet amidst the references, the gore and the splintering mind, there is a very human story, as BIG BABY’s metahorror is interwoven with a relationship drama, complete with an awkward dinner sequence featuring James and his partner Patrice (Kate Freund). The relationship between Adam and Kate fells genuine, inhabited and established. She understands his needs as a writer, his frustration with the podcast and excitement over his new project. However, as Adam proves something of a big baby himself, then shifts into increasingly unpleasant and erratic behaviour, sympathy is invited for Kate, whose initial support becomes suffering and eventually understandable fear. Yet the film maintains sympathy for Adam as well, despite his dickish behaviour, as he spirals into confusion and panic. He provides the essential element of horror – a victim – while Big Baby remains the monstrous threat, all the more ominous for the uncertainty that surrounds him. 

This uncertainty proves the film’s the greatest strength, as BIG BABY accomplishes one of the most difficult of balancing acts in horror and indeed any form of psychological drama – maintaining ambiguity. Throughout the film, the viewer is kept guessing as to whether the events are actual, psychological or supernatural. As well as being surprising and at times genuinely scary, the viewer can be left pondering whether Big Baby was real right up until the post-credits sequence. Even if the final image might suggest confirmation, there is still a question mark. Perhaps, like SCREAM, fans will be debating the seventh instalment of BIG BABY in thirty years’ time (and probably wishing the series had stopped earlier), but if this is the whole lot, Spider One’s intriguing, emotional, smart but never sly metahorror offers much enjoyment during its run time and can prompt many a discussion afterwards.

VINCENT’S ARCHIVE – BIG BABY