Horse Girl

Horse Girl

By James Davidson

“Horse Girl” is a movie that debuted in February 2020 on the popular streaming service, Netflix. It’s about a socially isolated, but otherwise normal girl named Sarah (played by Alison Brie). Sarah enjoys arts and crafts, a TV show called Purgatory, and spending time with her horse. She works at an arts and crafts store, and lives a fairly normal, if not introverted, life. Suddenly, Sarah begins to experience lucid dreams, sleepwalking, and missing time. She begins to research what could be wrong with her, Sarah decides she is either being abducted by aliens, or a time traveling clone of her grandmother. Everyone else in her life has decided that she is crazy. Sarah must try to determine what is happening to her, as well as prove to her friends and family that she is sane.

I decided to watch this movie after watching the trailer for it on Netflix. I thought it looked like a thought provoking thriller that might have a good plot that would have a lot of twists and turns. I ended up being a little disappointed in the plot and writing, but this film did provide a few surprises in ways that I wasn’t expecting.

Like I said earlier, I was hoping that this movie would have a thought provoking, labyrinthine plot, and it really tried to. Unfortunately, I think that it tried a little too hard. There were plenty of twists and turns, but they weren’t very unexpected. I often found myself just blankly staring at the screen with my mouth agape, trying to figure out what exactly I was looking at, and what exactly I was supposed to be thinking. I suppose this isn’t exactly a bad thing, it is thought provoking after all, it just doesn’t provoke the thoughts that I was anticipating. It ended up being a little more confusing and convoluted than I was hoping it would be. It seemed that even the director didn’t know which direction the story should be going, and it never really clears up even at the end.

While I felt that the plot felt a bit convoluted for my taste, the acting almost makes up for the lackluster plot. The performance given by Brie and the rest of the cast is simply incredible. I was a bit surprised at the quality of the acting since I wasn’t familiar with most of the cast, but their performance really carried the film. Brie really plays her role exceptionally well. It really made me wonder through most of the movie, if she was simply insane, or if some paranormal was really happening to her. The performance is even more impressive when you consider that the plot is a bit lackluster.

This movie has a lot of ups and downs, there were times that I thought this movie was amazing, and then other times where I was very confused and thought it wasn’t very good at all. The good parts are exceptionally good, unfortunately the bad parts are also exceptionally bad. It gets frustratingly inconsistent and makes it difficult to recomend to others.

“Horse Girl” is rated R and has quite a bit of drug and alcahol use, as well as some sex and nudity. It is definitely not intended for young viewers, it might not be a bad movie to watch with a few friends, or by yourself to pass some time while stuck at home. If you like trippy, artsy type movies, you might enjoy this film a bit more than I did.

“Horse Girl” is an inconsistent, trippy film. It has some stellar acting performances and is a good concept for a film. Unfortunately it just didn’t seem to be executed particularly well and gets a bit convoluted and confusing. I probably won’t watch this film again, but it is one of those movies that I think each person needs to decide for themselves. For me, it earns 3 out of 5 stars.