Nerds That Geek Movie Review: ‘Skew’

Written by Scott Edwards

​It is funny when you ask people of different ages about their past. While I come from a generation that loved to take pictures and insert them into a book called a photo album, most everybody today pulls out their phones and brings up Facebook. While times have surely changed, there still is something to keeping photos that are important to you and your explorations over the years. While most people think that they will never forget that one trip even if they don’t have the photos to prove it, as we get older, we sometimes start to lose our minds and along with that, our memories.
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Seeing his friends Richard and Eva pulling up, Simon cannot wait to get in the car and away from the house. With a new (to him) camera in hand, he is going to shoot everything along the way. Telling his friends that Laura is not going to be joining them on the adventure, Eva tries to have a little bit of girl talk with her friend to find out what is going on but cannot get anything out of the scorned woman. Knowing that it is something that Simon has done, Eva tries to get his side of the story, but hiding behind the camera, he will not tell his dirty little secret that will change his and his friend’s lives forever.

After spending their first night camping out under the stars, the group decides that they will stay in hotels from here on out. As the sun sets and they are speeding down the deserted highway, the group is startled when they hear a crash outside of the car. Getting out and seeing that they have hit a coyote, there is nothing that any of them can do as they watch it die. Being somewhat distressed, the group is able to make it to the hotel and ask the clerk what they should do with the carcass. After getting the good news that the roadkill will be theirs if they want it, Simon sees something through the camera as the clerk’s face is completely skewed. Wiping off the lens, Simon discounts it as a smudge, but when he is woken up in the middle of the night to a gun shot before finding the clerk dead, he starts to wonder what is going on.

After a very awkward evening of drinking and a fight between Eva and Richard, the group take to the road once again and come across an elk standing in the middle of the road. As Simon gets it on film and the group heads down the road, they hear a crash and turn around to see the elk lying dead, allowing for Simon to start to put the pieces together. Making to their next stop, Simon tries to put Eva’s mind at ease as they talk about his relationship. As Richard and Eva fall asleep, Simon tries to call Laura to see what she is up to, but when he hangs up the phone, the room comes alive and looking through the camera, he sees someone in the room with them. Waking up his friends to find that there is nobody there, Richard and Eva start to believe that Simon is going nuts as the images he says he is seeing are real, but not even the tape is catching it. With a second-hand camera in hand, Simon becomes obsessed with shooting everything in his path, but as he takes notice that everyone that he is filming is winding up dead, he knows that he cannot become one of the next victims.

I enjoyed the premise of this movie quite a bit, and while the ending left me wanting more, it kept my attention most of the way through. With his own problems to worry about, Simon winds up filming Richard and Eva’s couple problems, in the hopes that something will happen in his favor. Then there is the camera that is showing strange images only to Simon, which is a very cool idea, and it was fun when he was the only witness to what was happening to the group. But what I liked most about the story is Simon coming clean about what the camera is doing to him and his descent to a dark place when anyone questions him about it, even though he was not on screen. With a ghostly camera, spirits all around, people dying, animals dying, buildings burning down and only one person to blame for it all, the cause of the camera’s power may still be unanswered, but one thing remains certain; this camera will capture more than a memory, it will also steal your soul. Stay Scared.

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