INSTAKILLER: DTMWaGL #8
INSTAKILLER: DTMWaGL #8
Listen, I never said this was going to be art.
Hello friends! I hope you like stories about how social media websites that are legally distinct from the ones that exist here in real life are terrifying and bad, but also, maybe good? Buckle up for a tale of obsession and fashion and some really questionable names. (Content warnings for stalking and violence. No guns though!)
We open with a scene in which a bunch of college students stare dully at a pretty blonde professor who is showing them slides about the Trojan War. Helen of Troy, that’s a person who existed, in a manner of speaking! Actually I am just now, here, with you, learning that the Trojan War is not a real thing. I thought it was like, a real thing that had been interwoven with mythology? It is not. I am thirty-four years old and I did very well in school. While the professor talks about how obsession caused the Trojan War, we cut outside to two teens, one blonde white girl in an artfully cut-up t-shirt and one black girl with truly spectacular curls, taking selfies while walking down the street after school. A creepy guy in a hoodie watches them, and I know what you’re thinking: is this one of those suspense movies that would not exist if they were just shot from a different angle? Yes. This guy wears a hoodie and he is unstoppable. Another guy sees him taking pictures of the teens and tells him to stop being a creep, and gets his head slammed into a car for his trouble. What an interesting afternoon!
Now we are in a coffeeshop, and the blonde teen is there with her parents. Her name is Harper, her dad Derek owns Deja Vu Brew, and her mom Layla, while also a professor, just like, hangs out there, making lattes sometimes. Derek and Layla (DEREK and LAYLA, jesus christ) give Harper shit about looking at her phone too much, but she murmurs that she just got 1000 new Instapixer followers, because...and then she shrieks with glee, because she has been featured as an indie fashion designer to watch on the Buzzy List (this explains the cut-up t-shirt). Layla drives Harper home and tells her she’s a little nervous about this internet-famous thing, and Harper tells her that she’ll never get into a good design school without at least a couple thousand Insta followers. It is one of my favorite things about this movie that they say “Insta” like in real life but it’s Instapixer so please don’t sue us thank you.
At home, Layla tries to talk Harper into coming to dinner with her and Derek, but Harper would rather stay home sewing something new to show her followers and hanging out with her friend Monica, with the curls. She reassures her mom that she doesn’t have to worry, she’s totally recovered from “the transplant” (hmm?), and Layla agrees to let her stay home. As she and Derek leave, they chat with a security guy (sure) about a missing neighbor, who I’m guessing is the guy from the first scene. We never really get a button on that, it’s fine.
Monica comes over, and she advises Harper on flirting in the Insta DMs with a dude who is literally named Chad, but then someone else messages Harper, and it’s obviously the hoodie creep, because he knows what she’s wearing. She immediately blocks him for being creepy, and he, sitting in his car on a sun-soaked street, yells, “HARPER NO” long enough and loud enough that a security guy taps on the window to ask what’s up. The stalker immediately hops out of the car strangles him with a jumper cable. Again, it’s like 6 pm, on a densely populated street.
He’s wearing a hood and a mask and sunglasses, this is an impenetrable disguise
Layla and Derek walk home from dinner, and they’re cute, and they decide to throw a party for the one-year anniversary of Harper’s heart transplant. Heart transplant! She doesn’t have a scar, at all, and she seems 10000% fine, but she had a heart transplant a year ago. Okay! Good for her. Good for modern medicine!
At the coffeeshop (the next day? who knows) Monica and Harper talk about that guy she blocked, and also there’s another barista, his name is Joey and he and Harper are pals. Harper’s friends are Monica and Joey, and her parents are Derek and Layla. Just to make this clear. They chat with a regular customer named Russ, and you can tell they were told at the last second his name couldn’t be Ross. Anyway, Russ has two things: a giant crush on Harper, and a fedora. Wait no three things: a giant crush on Harper, a fedora, and an unfinished novel. After Russ leaves, the teens make fun of him, which is fair. Also he looks like if Jesse Camp got a haircut and a fedora? Russ. Okay. On the way home, Harper and Layla argue about Harper going away to college, and Harper offers to design something for her. Layla says okay but nothing too out there, because she’s a professor. Layla is wearing a denim romper.
The next day, back at Deja Vu, Joey hands Harper a gift bag someone left for her. It’s a teddy bear and a card from “your future and ONLY boyfriend.” Monica tells her she has to tell her parents that someone who knows where she works is stalking her, and Harper refuses, because they’re overprotective anyway, I guess. They go to Harper’s place to study, and also to scroll Insta, and someone has left a ton of comments on Harper’s posts with the hashtag #supportiveboyfriend and also posted a bunch of pictures of her, taken from a distance. Monica again tells her this is a big deal, and Harper, who is wearing seersucker culottes, says it isn’t. Monica goes in the kitchen and tells Derek and Layla anyway.
S e e r s u c k e r c u l o t t e s
After Derek calls the cops, who “can’t” “do” “anything,” Harper’s parents sit her down and tell her she has to delete her Instapixer account. Harper flips out and tells them that this will ruin her career before it even gets started, and that it isn’t fair. Layla agrees that it’s not fair, but she has to do it anyway. Harper makes a tearful goodbye post all about how her mom is interfering with her life but she’s so grateful for her now 100,000 followers, and it is watched by stock footage of young women looking at their computers and phones, and also the hoodie guy, who yells, “HARPER NO” and bangs on the table. This guy just loves banging on things!
Harper is being quarantined in the coffeeshop while the stalker situation sorts itself out, and she is just moping all over the counter. Harper please, people need their pastries. She is heartily cheered up when Monica comes in to give her Chad’s number as an apology for ratting on her stalker situation. Remember Chad? We haven’t met him. Layla is hanging out working on stuff for what they’re calling the Yay Me! Party for Harper, and Russ asks her about it and shimmies his way into an invitation to the party. He is still wearing his fedora. It might be a trilby, but also I do not care. They carry the party supplies to Layla’s car, only to find its windows smashed in, and “you can’t keep us apart!” scrawled on it. They call the cops again even though ACAB, and the detective is like, “oh lol it was probably just someone who didn’t like their coffee, or someone you gave a bad grade to,” and Derek and Layla are like, “no??? It was probably the stalker??? From before????? Otherwise the writing on the car makes zero sense?????” but you know. Cops! His only suggestion is to install a security camera, which they do.
At home, Harper cuts up a shitload of tomatoes to make what she describes as an “apology dinner” for her parents. She tells them she’s really sorry that she didn’t take the stalker situation seriously and that she should have listened to them. They tell her they understand and also give her a can of mace for protection. Her dinner looks good, good job Harper.
Some time later (dunno!), Layla’s phone starts buzzing with Insta DMs. They’re from Harper’s old account! Which the stalker has reactivated and is now using to send Layla a bunch of extremely unsettling pictures of her and her daughter, with Layla’s eyes scratched out, or with “bitch” written over her face. Also there are a lot of pictures of her taken in her classroom. Layla replies to try to goad him into saying who he is, but he blocks her, so Layla calls a friend with computer skills.
The friend with computer skills turns out to be a comp sci professor, because people in academia only know other people in academia. Professor Paige tells Layla that she can destroy any trace of Harper’s Insta, but she probably can’t figure out who was using it. Also she takes a moment to sermonize about how sad it is that these kinds of internet creeps seem so normal to kids these days. Well thanks a lot! What are we supposed to do, not post? Grow up, Paige. Layla leaves when she gets a call from Derek telling her that someone destroyed the outdoor surveillance camera. Who knows what else this guy will do!
Ah, he will tackle Harper while she walks down her street alone (why is she doing that right now, this afternoon? unclear). Harper maces him and gets away.
As you can see, this guy is a master criminal, impossible to catch, like the Zodiac
Derek and Layla set up a new surveillance camera, inside this time, with Paige’s help, until Harper calls her mom to tell her she was attacked. They call the detective again and he finally decides to tell them he can help. He can’t, but he can tell them he can. Derek and Layla (god, these names) decide that the best thing to do is send Harper and Layla to live with Derek’s sister Raquel in Portland for a while, but Harper hates this idea. She can’t finish her junior year in Portland! She’ll miss prom! Junior prom, Harper, settle down.
The next morning at the coffeeshop, Harper sits cross-legged on the counter with her shoes on while she and Monica discuss how bad this Portland idea is. What if she’s at some new agey school that doesn’t believe in prom! Sounds great, prom is a scam. Joey tells her she’ll hate Portland, and Russ uses an inappropriate level of passion to tell her her parents can’t make her do anything she doesn’t want to do, look at him, he’s finishing his novel. Thanks,,,, Russ. Joey tells her that at least she knows she’s safe in the coffeeshop, and she hugs him and tells him she loves him. I’m writing this after watching the movie and I just realized I’m picturing Joey as the guy from 10 Things I Hate About You who went on to form a cult and get arrested for selling kombucha that had too much alcohol in it. That guy. You know.
Just take a moment please and imagine seeing this at a coffeeshop you were planning to get a latte at
That night, Layla walks around campus talking to Raquel about staying with her, and then someone runs out of the shadows, whacks her with a golf club, and runs off. Good thing Russ is there to help her up and make sure she’s okay! Hi Russ. You sure are here.
Layla calls the same fucking detective, who comes to the house and tells them that well, this isn’t just a stalking investigation, it’s an aggravated assault investigation now. He already attacked Harper, but sure. He also mentions that they found the body of the security guy who got strangled in broad-ass daylight a couple days ago (a couple days?? I have no idea), and is that related? Who knows! I’m just a cop, I don’t know shit and you can’t make me know shit!
In the morning, Layla goes to class to tell her students that she’ll be taking a leave of absence, but then her phone starts blowing up with Insta DMs from the stalker, and then texts, and then he calls her, so Layla ends class bye, learn about the Iliad on your own, suckers. Layla rushes to Paige, who triangulates the signal from the text (sure) and it turns out it’s in the coffeeshop! Paige *69s the number and Russ’s backpack starts ringing. Also, Russ has a laptop cover that makes his laptop look like a leatherbound book. What a dork. Russ snaps his leatherbound book, oh, I’m sorry, it’s a laptop, my mistake, he snaps his laptop closed and gets up to leave Deja Vu, so Derek tries to stall him by asking about his book. Ah, well, he blew up a spaceship today so that’s good progress, ha ha. This is not the book I expected, I have to say. When Russ tries to get past Derek and leave, Derek grabs his backpack and Joey finds his phone in the bag. Also the cops are here now. We’re saved! Russ says that isn’t his phone, and that they’ve all seen him on his phone, that’s not it, but he’s led away in handcuffs. He is not read his rights.
Sorry but just, he’s literally always wearing this hat, the same hat, I think his hair is attached to it
At home, the family makes dinner. Harper’s parents say they can’t believe it was Russ the whole time, and Harper says she absolutely can believe it, he was always flirty and weird with her even after she turned him down several times, and also she is a high school junior and he has already dropped out of college. Also, apparently they are having about a dozen bell peppers and a bag of flour for dinner, because that is what is on the counter.
The next morning, Monica bursts into Deja Vu to scold Harper for turning down Chad. “Harper, this is what you always wanted,” says HARPER’S MOM, which is just, the most normal part of this normal movie. Harper points out that they might have nothing in common, and also that they all thought Russ was harmless and what if Chad is a serial killer. What if anyone is a serial killer! What if I’m a serial killer. They finally convince Harper to go out with Chad, by reminding her of the time there was a spider in English class and he took it outside instead of squishing it. That’s romance, babbyyyyy!
The Yay Me! Party happens, and it’s basically nothing. Harper, Monica, and Joey try to talk Derek into giving them champagne, but it’s cheap garbo anyway. Ah, Andre, a fine vintage.
Then Chad and Harper finally have their date! Wow. The beginning of an era. He’s cute. He looks like his name is Chad. Harper is nervous and starts babbling about a documentary about the Ming dynasty that she watched, and then thinks she’s a dork, but it turns out Chad also watched that documentary, and he watched it with his parents so who’s the dork now, huh? After dinner, Chad takes Harper home and asks her to rate their date on a scale of 1 to 19, and Harper gives him an 8 so that he’ll try even harder next time. Harper! You can’t tell him that! They stare at each other and almost smooch, but Derek starts flashing the porch light and scowling in a very dad-like manner. Then they smooch anyway. Teens! Harper goes inside and Chad starts down the driveway, only to be immediately, and I mean immediately attacked by the stalker. He takes a golf club to the head, and then the stalker runs off. I cannot emphasize enough how much someone should have seen this happening, but Layla pulls into the driveway just a moment too late, and sees a prone and bleeding Chad. She calls an ambulance for the popular teen.
She is wearing a studded denim shirt with the shoulders haphazardly cut out, a crop top, and matching pencil skirt
Harper and her parents sit at the table that rich people have in their living rooms and discuss Chad, who will be fine, and Russ, who is clearly not the stalker. Of course he isn’t. But gosh, he had the phone! Who was phone?? If only there were a way to find out!
It’s another morning at Deja Vu, and Harper works on some fashion stuff under the watchful eye of Joey the barista. She’s a fashion designer, you know. She and Layla decide to go see Chad at the hospital after Layla gets back from her meeting with the dean. She’s a professor, you know. Layla never quite makes it to the meeting though, because when she’s in the waiting room, she sees a camera and suddenly realizes the camera at Deja Vu would have caught whoever planted the phone in Russ’s bag. Surely a) someone should have thought of this already, and b) it is not hard to figure out who a phone belongs to, but everyone in this movie is incredibly bad at this, and this comes as a revelation. Harper and Derek pull up the footage and why, the only person who went near Russ’s bag was Joey! On the phone, Layla rises from her chair in epiphany, and says, “It’s Joey! You must have noticed his monster crush on you!” Joey creeps down the hallway in time to hear Harper say, “yeah but it’s not like we’d ever go out,” and in voiceover (the only voiceover in this movie) he says, “yes, we could, I’ve been here the whole time,” while a montage of Harper smiling at him or whatever plays. His voiceover continues, “I never meant to hurt you, I love you more than anything,” while the montage also continues, incorporating that time he grabbed her on the street. He never meant to hurt her, just terrify and control her. It’s romance! Layla tells Harper and Derek to act normal, and heads to the coffeeshop. Wait, is Joey in one of Layla's classes? Where did all the photos of her in class come from? Well anyway.
Ope, by the time Layla gets to Deja Vu, Derek is beaten up and Harper is gone. She calls Harper’s phone but she’s in Joey’s trunk and can’t come to the phone right now. Paige can track the phone and send Layla on the right track, but only up to the point where Joey gets tired of it ringing and pulls over to smash it with his golf club. Does Joey… play golf? I don’t have any golf clubs, personally. Do you? Let me know in the replies! While Joey is smashing her phone, Harper climbs out of the trunk, smashes his head into the trunk of the car, and takes off into the woods (if you can call this dusty-ass southern California stretch of scrubby little trees “the woods”).
Layla finds Joey’s abandoned car and faintly hears Joey yelling for Harper in the woods, so she picks up the golf club and goes after them. Before she can find them, Joey catches Harper and tackles her. He then yells his reasoning for stalking her into her face, which is that his mom died from the same heart condition Harper had, and then it seemed like a second chance when Harper had it? But Harper lived, with the transplant? This is extremely strange reasoning. But then she got internet-famous and it was simply too much for him to deal with, plus the whole Chad thing, you know. Harper pleads with him that that if he really loves her he’ll let her go, but he disagrees and has another little internal montage about how pretty Harper is, except this time he is choking her in the dirt. It’s bad! Good thing Layla is here now, and she whacks Joey in the head with the golf club. I’m sorry, it just? It seems like the golf club should have some significance? They played mini golf together as kids or something? I’m trying to help, here. Anyway Layla revives and unties her sobbing daughter. She’s been through a lot.
That same goddamn detective shows up and arrests Joey for all the crimes and murder and stuff. Thanks, pal.
At some point, “later,” Derek and Layla tell Harper she can restart her Instapixer account, as long as she doesn’t use her real name or face or any identifying information, which seems like it’ll be hard to launch a career from or whatever, but Harper’s happy, and the movie ends with a little fashion show in the living room, because Harper made Layla a dress. The… end? Sure. The end.
The books in this professor’s house are arranged by color, and the only ones I can make out are Danielle Steel, Faye Kellerman, a set of World Book encyclopedias, and a 1991 book about Donald Trump