Faces of Death (2026)

Although the original 1978 Faces of Death turned out to be mostly a put-up job (see also Cannibal Holocaust) it did include some of its main selling point, that is, actual footage of deaths, accidents, and corpses. I want to be clear I never went for it, nor for Mondo Cane or a similar series in the ‘90s whose name escapes me and appears to be forgotten even by the internet. I realized my limits with these exercises—plain images of death too real do not work for me as entertainment or in any other way. This so-called “reimagining” of Faces of Death is more my speed, all fiction and special effects, though sadly it does not have anything in particular to recommend it. Barbie Ferreira plays Margot Romero (Romero, wink-wink), who works for a social media company reviewing videos that have been reported by users. She approves some, disapproves others—her choices can be a funny commentary on this crazy world we live in today and may be the single best part of the picture. She runs across a series of videos made by the same content creator re-creating some of the mayhem and specific deaths in the original Faces of Death. Margot has her own sad history with gonzo internet content creation which we find more about in piecemeal fashion. She’s on the case but no one, of course, will listen. This Faces of Death relies on all kinds of familiar tropes such as only one character who can see the truth and is unable to convince anyone else, including police. Also, victims tend to make terrible decisions, as seen in countless other horror movies. Viewers often speak aloud to the screen, saying, “No, please, don’t do that.” Or wait, that was just me sitting by myself in my room. The motto of this picture: “The first rule of content creation is give the people what they want.” And we know well, in this day and age, all the things that can mean: conflict, violence, gore, and mean comments. Charli XCX has a part as one of Margot’s coworkers. Dacre Montgomery is the terrible killer, Arthur Spevak. You might recognize him from the TV series Stranger Things. I had hopes this Faces of Death would be better than it is, but it’s competent enough—and Ferreira is good enough in the main role—it’s probably worth putting toward the back end of some weekend double feature or horror fest.