“Thunderbolt and lightning, very, very frightening” – these lyrics from the iconic Queen song “Bohemian Rhapsody” came immediately to my mind during the opening scene of the short horror film “Don’t Look at your Phone,” where the protagonist is sitting on a couch, thunder and lightning cracking outside, but she is busy buried in her phone. Thanks to our phones, we’re never really alone, so power cuts and sudden loud rumblings in the skies are no longer scary, not when a funny meme/video is always a second away.
Written and directed by Alex Magaña, the four minute short is a quick, fun cautionary tale about cellphone addiction. Chiaki Summer plays the nameless protagonist, who is lost in her phone when her boyfriend comes to say goodbye – he is leaving for an off-the-grid trip and hopes she’ll do fine by herself. So does she do fine by herself? Not really. Or it wouldn’t be a horror film!
With a straightforward plot and agenda, “Don’t Look At Your Phone” isn’t exactly scary in the traditional sense, but serves as a metaphorical reality check for anybody who shares a more than cozy relationship with their phone. Its sheer simplicity and relatable quotient of a woman getting lost in her phone keep the film amusing and are made eerily entertaining by Chiaki Summer’s portrayal of a seemingly normal young woman who lets her device take over her life.
You can watch “Don’t Look at your Phone” on YouTube. It’s also embedded below.