From Omeleto.
A journalist angers some fans.
RAT is used with permission from Neal Suresh Mulani. Learn more at https://nealmulani.com.
Navin is a socially anxious music journalist. When he discovers the music of Wally Max, he calls out Max for queerbaiting. Navin’s spicy, rancorous opinion on Wally Max goes viral, giving him some new prominence in his career.
However, Navin’s commentary also sparks a wrathful backlash from Wally Max’s devout fans. As Navin himself bites back, the online fury escalates to a full‑blown home invasion by the star’s more obsessive fan base, who will stop at nothing until Navin takes back what he put out about their beloved pop star.
Directed and written by Neal Suresh Mulani, who also plays Navin, this razor-sharp dark comedy skewers a media landscape stuffed with inane cultural products, parasocial relationships and rigid and fanatical digital identities communities. With hilariously cutting cultural observations and witty, fast-paced storytelling, it captures one of the cesspools of modern life: stan culture weaponized by the lightning-fast echo chambers of social media.
The storytelling is lean and nimble, with its first half leaning on comedic satire about music, queer culture and social media mores. The writing is smart, funny and merciless, lampooning the lowest-common-denominator nature of insipid pop music and its marketing with a series of rapid-fire clips. As played by Mulani, Navin’s hot take is pitiless in its disdain, taking down queer fans falling for Wally Max’s pandering, and it gets him plenty of attention, especially from rabid fans of Wally Max.
They harass Navin online, sending him threatening messages and doxxing him, with quicksilver detail shots showing the viciousness of their anger and threats. All of these demonstrate an aggressive entitlement, where digital swarms coalesce into barrages of online bullying and danger. But that menace migrates to real life, and when fans start showing up at Navin’s address in real life, it escalates into something darker and more sinister.
By this point, the film enters a stylistic mode somewhere between thriller and horror, ratcheting up the suspense and tension. The cinematography becomes cold and shadowy in tone and tenor, taking its cues from classic horror films, with their sharp instincts for maximizing dread, chaos and shock. But even when Navin finds himself at his most perilous point, the narrative never loses its savage wit, making for a particularly modern take on a classic genre.
RAT builds up to a pulse-pounding confrontation, and then a disquieting denouement. Its blend of humor and horror makes for ferocious social commentary, pointing out the particular toxicities of online culture, from runaway memes to doxxing to uniquely contemporary forms of harassment. Even Navin isn’t immune to it: his clapbacks and takedowns lead him into danger, his digital words leading to palpable real-life consequences. And yet we get the sense at the end that he can’t quite quit this immediate hit, making for a dark feedback loop and a destructive cycle.
