Domonic

The scouts

Smart-home-as-horror is the exact kind of played-to-death premise that makes most films invisible, but Cruz leans into the *wrongness* of it—treating the software less as antagonist and more as an incomprehensible presence that makes your skin crawl. It's a subversion by restraint, which is refreshing.

The film positions itself thoughtfully within the sci-fi-thriller tradition, building dread through careful mise-en-scène and sound design that recalls Kubrick's precision without aping it; the formal control here—what's shown, what's withheld—demonstrates a director aware of the grammar they're speaking.

The real lift is how Cruz uses the *interface itself* as the emotional core—the cold, mundane surfaces of switches and screens become uncanny simply through how they're lit and framed, a choice that costs nothing but suggests everything, turning a low-budget premise into something that genuinely unsettles.