‘Bloat’ Review: When the Chosen Format Undercuts the Impact of the Story

Some stories benefit from being told through a computer screen. Bloat is not one of them.

Magic Symbol: Thorn Rune
Bloat began streaming on March 7, 2025.

Table of Contents

What is Bloat About?

Bloat (2025)
The whole movie (well, almost the whole movie) takes place as if we’re watching Jack’s computer screen.

Bloat utilizes a computer-screen format (aka screenlife) to tell a story about a father’s attempt to save his son from possession.

Jack plans a family vacation to Tokyo, but his work in the military forces him to deploy to the Middle East. His wife and two sons continue with the Japan trip as planned. While there, Jack’s youngest son, Kyle, nearly drowns in a pond. Afterward, Kyle displays bizarre behavior which stresses Jack’s wife Hannah to her breaking point. While stuck in a different country, Jack keeps up with his family through video calls. He also takes it upon himself to investigate Kyle’s behavior, which leads him to believe that his son might be possessed by a Japanese spirit.

Bloat was written and directed by Pablo Absento. The film stars Ben McKenzie (Gotham) as Jack, and Bojana Novakovic (2010’s Devil) as Hannah. Malcolm Fuller and Sawyer Jones play Jack and Hannah’s sons Steve and Kyle, and Kane Kosugi (DOA: Dead or Alive) is Jack’s friend Ryan.

Bloat Review

Bloat (2025)
Jack relives a painful memory via a video on his computer.

Some movies work well in the screenlife format. Host (2020), Unfriended (2014), and Unfriended: Dark Web (2018) are great examples of the computer-screen movie done well. Bloat, unfortunately, does not belong on that list.

The movie starts off well enough. Jack and Hannah’s tragic backstory of losing a child is brought up early, so right away there’s good context for the tension between the two of them that pops up from time to time. It also helps explain why Jack is so exuberant when trying to connect with his family via his computer. So yes, the setup is good. But when the spooky stuff is supposed to start, it never gets very spooky.

Bloat (2025)
Experiencing the story from the perspective of Jack’s son Steve would have likely been the most exciting way to present the film.

The biggest issue is that the computer screen format is completely wrong for the way the plot unfolds. We’re experiencing everything from Jack’s point of view, but Jack rarely sees Kyle’s odd behavior firsthand. He gets a brief glimpse here and there, but most of the time he is just told what’s happening by Hannah and Kyle’s older brother Steve. The scary stuff happens off screen, and we merely have it explained to us. Having the audience watch a movie from what is kind of a secondhand source isn’t a great way to build fear and tension.

Bloat (2025)
The “spookiest” change in Jack’s behavior that we actually see for a decent amount of time is that he begins craving cucumbers. If you know your Japanese yokai, then that’s a big giveaway for what might be possessing Jack. It’s just an odd choice to make eating cucumbers one of the main traits we’re shown.

Jack isn’t necessarily a passive character, but he’s left out of the actual drama and action for nearly the entire movie. I suppose there’s a way to make that feel tense, but in Bloat it mostly just gives the viewer a sense of detachment from the horror. That is completely contrary to what a screenlife movie is supposed to do. A screenlife movie, like a found footage movie, should make the viewer feel like they’re part of the action. More like a first-person perspective instead of third-person. Bloat never feels like we’re part of the action.

Bloat (2025)
A few times throughout Bloat we can see Jack’s reflection in the screen, as if there is an invisible external camera pointed at his computer. This sort of thing breaks immersion, which is so important for screenlife and found footage movies.

Also, and this is just a matter of personal taste, but I don’t like it when screenlife movies manipulate the screen to draw attention to certain things or to artificially build drama. What I mean is, I don’t like it when the image zooms and pans to specific parts of the screen. And I really don’t like it when non-diegetic music is added. I prefer computer screen movies when the screen itself is static. It’s the full screen the entire time, with nothing zoomed or cropped. Ever. I want it to look and sound like we’re watching what could be a recording straight from someone’s screen, untouched. That automatically builds tension because it feels more real. More immediate. These are feelings Bloat has trouble conveying, and the cinematic manipulation of the screen is part of the reason why.

Bloat (2025)
I do appreciate the parts where the yokai (spirit) is investigated, but the application of the yokai’s attributes feels obvious and weirdly generic.

Also, by the end of the movie it stops being a computer screen film. Jack leaves his computer at a certain point, and the final few minutes are shown to us through things like security cameras and news footage. We’re no longer at Jack’s desktop, which means screenlife was a bad choice for telling this story. If the climax of the movie can’t be told effectively in the chosen format, a different format should have been used.

Bloat Rating and Recommendation

Bloat (2025)
Maybe skip this one.

Star Rating: 1.5 out of 5

If you want a good curse/possession movie based in Japanese culture, there are plenty of them out there. If you want a good screenlife movie, there are a fair number of those as well. Bloat isn’t a great representation of either of those categories, so I can’t recommend it. It’s simply the wrong story for the format.

Bloat is currently available for digital rental and purchase on VOD sites including Amazon Prime Video.

Further Reading

Meet The Author

Chris has a degree in film studies at Temple University’s campus in Tokyo, Japan. He is a renowned expert on horror cinema.