Film Review: 'A.M.I.'

17-year-old Cassie (Debs Howard) hasn't been the same since the tragic car accident that claimed her mother's life—an accident that left Cassie with brain damage and a deep sense of guilt over her role in the accident. Now seeing a therapist and taking medication for her head injuries, Cassie struggles to move past her trauma, but finds it difficult due to feeling isolated by her estranged father Greg (Philip Granger) and her boyfriend Liam (Sam Robert Muik).

Things change, however, when Cassie comes across a discarded phone with a sole app on it: "A.M.I.," a Siri-esque app that allows the user to customize the virtual assistant's voice. Cassie is surprised to find the app is able to replicate the voice of her deceased mother, leading the lonely teen to become increasingly attached to the app. When A.M.I. reveals the treacherousness of the people she considers friends, however, the impressionable Cassie is goaded into enacting a violent campaign of retribution, proving just how far A.M.I. is prepared to go to be Cassie's "mother"....

Cyber horror has always been one of my favorite horror sub-genres, so A.M.I. and its' "Siri as a protective psychopath" premise had me intrigued as soon as I heard about the film. Once the film hit Netflix and the plethora of reviews that came out proved to be a mix of good and bad, my expectations hit a crossroads on whether this would be a fun horror flick about a psychotic app or if this would be a waste-of-potential dud in the vast field of mediocre horror B-movies. The end result was ultimately the best of both worlds: while there are a handful of problems that arise, A.M.I. turned out to be an enjoyable little horror romp helmed by a spectacular lead who does what she can to make up for the movie's lesser qualities.

That lead, as you can guess, would be Debs Howard as troubled teen Cassie. Having previously appeared on my review plate as a strong side character in Lifetime's Deadly Match, Howard definitely steps up to the plate and excels as A.M.I.'s villainous leading lady. While the opening suffers from dragging on longer than necessary, Howard utilizes the time the film gives her to develop her character, allowing the viewer to see and empathize with Cassie as she finds herself alone and somewhat abandoned by those around her as she struggles to deal with her grief. Howard's performance continues to impress as Cassie begins her violent downward spiral, and while it takes some suspension of disbelief to accept that an app sounding like her late mother is enough to transform Cassie from a deeply troubled but somewhat stable teen into a vengeful murderer, Howard's driven portrayal of Cassie's descent into madness is strong enough to make that an easier pill to swallow.

WARNING: MAJOR Spoilers Below

Viewers might also sympathize with Cassie for the fact that, apart from two, none of the people Cassie and A.M.I. work together to kill are sympathetic or even likable. While this was likely intentional in regards to Sarah—played well by Veronica Hampson even as Sarah's mega-bitch act goes a tad too far and becomes ridiculous—and especially Liam (more on him later), A.M.I. drops the ball in its "Root for the Killer" model by trying to humanize Cassie's horrifically neglectful father Greg. Philip Granger does what he can with Greg as he becomes aware of Cassie's instability and tries to get her the help she needs, Greg spends so much of the film ignoring his daughter in favor of drinking and having flings that his sudden care for Cassie feels hollow and abrupt. The fact that it takes finding out Cassie killed someone (something he only learned about because he was prepared to have sex with the high school aged Sarah!) to get him to start caring about his daughter's well-being only compounds his status as unintentionally unsympathetic.

As for Liam, while given a wonderfully sleazy performance by Sam Robert Muik, his character is given a similar abrupt shake-up that Greg's gets. After much of the film is dedicated to building Liam up as an average "Unfaithful, Sex-Crazed Boyfriend" trope, having him suddenly transform into a violent psychopath who takes sadistic pleasure in attacking Cassie after her attempt to kill him comes out of nowhere. After two acts of showing Liam as unapologetically awful, turning him into an outright monster is not necessary to give Cassie an empathetic reason to murder him. Meanwhile, Havana Guppy appears as Cassie's sole good friend Ruby, though her screen time before her death is so short that Guppy is never given the chance to capitalize on Ruby's likability.

Spoilers Over

A.M.I. also fumbles a bit when it comes to the black comedy elements scattered throughout itself. Some of these bits (the way the film's first casualty plays out, A.M.I.'s use of fairy tales analogues to describe Cassie's actions, the second A.M.I. that comes into play) work well or are at least bearable, while others (the visual gag when A.M.I. finds evidence against Sarah and Liam and Liam proclaiming he "sees things other people can't" while blissfully unaware of what's right underneath him) come off as too hokey for the film that surround them.

As much complaints I've had with characterization and tone, A.M.I. succeeds in being entertaining thanks to a combination of an excellent lead performance, solid pacing that leads to a fierce climax, and which all gets wrapped up in an ending that is equal parts disturbing and heartbreaking. If you're able to take the bad with the good, A.M.I. is a solid horror flick to watch if you're in the mood for a fun cyber horror film where you can root for the bad guy a-la Unfriended.

Score: 6.5 out of 10 burial barrels.