One of the troubles with dating in the era of apps is that you just never know who could be on the other end. This a very legitimate concern for today’s young women and great launching off pad for a horror film. The terrifying uncertainty that comes after hooking up with a recent stranger is an idea director Mini Cave explores debut feature Fresh. Fresh starts looking like a satirical rom-com about modern dating, but it soon takes a delicious dark turn designed to catch many off guard. (Fans of Audition will know this drill.)

In Fresh, Noa (Daisy Edgar-Jones) is having no luck finding romance through her phone. The film begins by showing her first date sour after Chad, Noa’s unsuitable scarf-wearing match, comments negatively on her apparel. And though it’s intentionally easy to pick apart all the things wrong with Chad, Noa’s disinterest throughout the proceeding is all too apparent. She is tired of the Chad’s of the world and is eager to cut ties with them early…but if the dating app keeps finding her Chads, then what’s a girl to do?

Such is Noa’s dilemma, until one day she is approached by the handsome Steve (Sebastian Stan) in a supermarket and he successfully- in a skillfully awkward way- talks her into giving him her phone number. 

At first, Steve seems like quite the catch. He comes across as a genuine guy who has good taste in bars and has a decent job as a plastic surgeon. Noa, feeling a connection she hasn’t felt in a while, even has sex with him on the first date. Everything moves fast, as it often does with adults when everything feels right. Cave offers the set up for a perfect romance. Steve even invites Noa for a weekend getaway. Where? That will be a surprise.

First red flag.

It takes Fresh 33-minutes before the title credits roll, but when they do it announces a seismic tonal change. SPOILER COMING. Fresh is literally a film about turning those of the female population into meat for the elite 1%. Not that seasoned horror fans wouldn’t sense the shift coming. (Otherwise, what was the point of that fake-out stalker scene.) But after reading online audience reviews, it is clear that a few Sebastian Stan fans browsing Hulu were caught a little off-guard seeing the Marvel heart-throb ex-assassin play a more grounded type of serial killer. 

Fresh is best described as a thriller with horror and dark comedic undertones. Tonally, that may sound like a lot to juggle, but Cave makes it gel by toning down the gore and ramping up the quirkiness of the film’s unusual premise. Unlike a typically abduction story containing appalling hard to watch scenes, Fresh comes across more like Hostel-lite. Sure some gore fans may be disappointed, but the majority will find Fresh’s viewability as one of its strengths. It never is overly uncomfortable to watch and this helps set it apart from the fray.

Yes, Fresh contains undertones that will enrage those who think being woke is an indicator of poor quality. (You know, the “Go woke, go broke” crowd.) If that’s you, maybe skip this one- but know that when you arbitrarily limit your choices, you are going to miss out. Yes, the few men in this film are not characterized in the best light. And yes, some of the dialogue sounds like pseudo-feminist “woke” jingoism. But should that really be unexpected from a film about men eating the meat off women? Thematically, it works and given their experiences within the film, the woman have every right to say and feel as they do.

If there is a true stand out performance in Fresh, it comes from Sebastian Stan as Steve, or is it Brendan? This is a fantastic role. Steve is a serial killer that can be unusually kind to his victims. It is not that he isn’t a sadistic bastard, but he tries to hide it behind an all-business, nothing-personal veneer. He knows that any compliancy and acceptance from his victims makes taking their flesh that much easier. I mean, carving people up is hard enough as is…right? There is a hypocrisy about Steve that is different, but still a bit reminiscent of Bale’s Patrick Bateman in American Psycho. Cave knows she has something special with this character, so she teases us with a slow rollout about who he is and how he spends his days. (What? He has a wife?) It is all very entertaining stuff.

And the soundtrack in Fresh is a great mix of indie rock, classic hard rock and pop. We even get the Duran Duran cover of “A Perfect Day”.  But then again, that should be expected of a director who got her start by shooting music videos.

Fresh is a powerful parabolic warning for how entering a relationship with controlling, manipulative man can slowly eat away at a young woman, in this case literally. And its fusion of horror and humour gives the film enough quirk to keep it fun. 

Making a thriller that doubles as a dark comedy for a first film is not an easy undertaking, but Fresh shows that Cave is adept at finding tonal balance. I look forward to Cave’s sophomore feature.