Fantasia Festival 2025: ‘Influencers’ ups the ante in every possible way

In the era of influencer horror, there are few able to deftly walk the fine line between horror and satire. Kurtis David Harder masters the subgenre with sly ease with Influencers, playing this year’s Fantasia Fest. As the follow-up to his splashy 2022 film, Influencer, the sequel winds up the social commentary, preposterous insanity, and the ever-expanding world-building like the Energizer Bunny. Cassandra Naud returns as the enigmatic CW and delivers a career-making performance that is even more unhinged than you can imagine.

CW manages to escape the island she found herself on at the end of Influencer. Now, she’s living her best life with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in France, and nothing could be more perfect! That’s until she meets an influencer named Charlotte (Georgina Campbell), who immediately catches CW’s eye. She soon finds herself up to her old tricks, but this time, she plays double duty, trying to conceal the truth from Diane while ruining the life of another social media celebrity. Celebrating their first anniversary, CW and Diane rent a room at a lavish, secluded hotel to reconnect and recharge their relationship. What begins as a lovely vacation quickly devolves into chaos. The web CW weaves here is even stickier, more diabolical, and campy af. Harder understands the assignment and gives fans exactly what they want in a sequel.

CW also befriends obnoxious, male-first streamer Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell) and his Conservative Barbie girlfriend Ariana (Veronica Long). They are the worst of the worst, tapping into controversies and drama for likes. Harder sharpens his fangs on these close-to-home characters that feel ripped from real life. A little outlandish and a whole lotta fun, Influencers is the romp of the year. It’s not enough to comment on social media and the influencer era; you have to have a villain worth rallying around. CW is both wonderfully disarming and unequivocally batshit crazy. Naud slips into the role like a chameleon, and you forget that you’re actually watching a movie.

Meanwhile, Madison (Emily Tennant), who trapped CW on the island, is hot on her heels. After Madison’s return to civilization, she became a social pariah, with many claiming she made the whole thing up. She begins her search for CW through online sleuthing, like stalking an ex, and eventually tracks down the hotel at which she was staying. The film’s soap opera tendencies serve the story well – it’s so crazy, you can hardly believe your eyes. But you stay hooked as CW spirals out of control, leading to a primal ending that very much could be used to jumpstart a third film, if Harder so chooses.

Influencers arrives as a sequel that surpasses the original in every way. When I sit down to watch influencer horror, I want big, bad, and bold. In this heightened reality, Kurtis David Harder delivers a sequel to die for. And Naud pushes the boundaries in exhilarating ways that are bound to shock you, and creates an iconic villain that’ll be immortalized within the confines of the Influencer world. Count Influencers as the template by which all other influencer horror films should be judged. It’s damn near perfect.