Faces of Death
Here's something you don't expect to say about a Faces of Death remake: it has something on its mind.
Full analysis belowNot a woke trap. The film's woke margin is effectively zero (0.06 points separating trad from woke). A film must score with a negative margin and hide its woke content past the 50% runtime mark to qualify as a trap. Neither condition is met here. The progressive casting (Josie Totah, Charli XCX) and platform critique are visible from the trailers.
Here's something you don't expect to say about a Faces of Death remake: it has something on its mind.
The 1978 original was a fake documentary that presented staged death footage as real, made for $450,000, and became one of the most notorious exploitation films in cinema history. It had no political agenda. It was pure shock value for shock value's sake. It ran in grindhouses and video stores because people wanted to see something they weren't supposed to see. Simple.
Daniel Goldhaber's remake is not simple. Goldhaber made Cam (2018), a horror film about a camgirl whose identity is stolen by her own livestream doppelganger. He made How to Blow Up a Pipeline (2022), an eco-thriller based on an actual manifesto about climate sabotage. He is a filmmaker with a political brain. Bringing him to Faces of Death means the material has been transformed from exploitation into social horror.
The premise: a woman (Barbie Ferreira) works as a content moderator on a YouTube-like platform. She discovers a group recreating the murder scenes from the 1978 Faces of Death film. The question she cannot answer: is what she's seeing real, or staged? As misinformation spreads online about what the videos contain, the lines between truth and performance dissolve.
That's smart. It's genuinely smart. The 'is it real or fake?' question that made the original notorious is now a question about the information ecosystem. We live in an era when content moderation is a real industry, when millions of people watch other humans flag and remove violent content for a living, when the line between documented reality and staged performance has been industrial-grade blurred. The premise updates the original's concern without abandoning it.
Barbie Ferreira carries the film. She's better than her Euphoria years suggested. Playing someone who stares at horror for a living and slowly loses the ability to determine what is real is a real acting challenge. Dacre Montgomery (Stranger Things) plays what appears to be a significant supporting role, though details have been kept tight. Josie Totah and Charli XCX round out the ensemble. That casting tells you something about the film's sensibility. Goldhaber is not making a conservative horror movie.
For VirtueVigil purposes: this one is genuinely mixed. The woke elements are present. Goldhaber's tech-platform critique reads progressive: he's interrogating corporations that profit from violent content, arguing that the platforms bear moral responsibility for what flows through them. The casting includes openly LGBTQ talent in the form of Totah and Charli XCX. The protagonist is a woman navigating a system of male-created violence.
But the traditional elements are also real and they carry weight. Horror, properly made, functions as moral literature. Death matters. Violence has consequences. The protagonist's psychological deterioration is not celebrated; it's a horror film's version of a cautionary tale about what it costs to stare into the abyss. Individual moral agency: she must determine what is true, and that determination has stakes. Voyeurism has consequences. The film's very premise argues that watching death for entertainment is dangerous. That's not a progressive message. That's a very old one.
The budget was $7.4 million. IFC is giving it their widest release ever. It premiered at Beyond Fest Chicago on 35mm. These are signs of a film the distributor believes in. Whether the horror audience shows up for a Faces of Death remake that's also a meditation on content moderation is the commercial question.
Bottom line: see it if you like smart horror. Go in knowing what it is. It scored essentially flat on the VirtueVigil scale, which means it genuinely earns its mixed designation. Not a traditional film. Not an aggressively woke one either. Just a good, unsettling horror movie that happens to have a brain.
Formula: Weighted Score = Severity × Authenticity Multiplier × Centrality Multiplier
🔴 Woke Tropes
| Trope | Severity | Authenticity | Centrality | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anti-Platform / Corporate Media Critique | 3 | High | High | 3.78 |
| Misinformation / Media Literacy Theme | 2 | Moderate | Moderate | 2 |
| LGBTQ Representation in Cast | 2 | Moderate | Moderate | 2 |
| Female Protagonist in Truth-Seeker / Whistleblower Role | 2 | High | High | 2.52 |
| TOTAL WOKE | 10.3 | |||
🟢 Traditional Tropes
| Trope | Severity | Authenticity | Centrality | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Horror as Moral Literature: Death Has Weight | 3 | High | High | 3.78 |
| Individual Moral Agency: The Protagonist Must Determine What Is True | 3 | High | High | 3.78 |
| Voyeurism Has Consequences | 2 | High | Moderate | 1.4 |
| Genre Fidelity to Exploitation Horror Roots | 2 | High | Moderate | 1.4 |
| TOTAL TRADITIONAL | 10.4 | |||
Score Margin: 0 NEUTRAL
Director: Daniel Goldhaber
LEFT. Goldhaber and co-writer Isa Mazzei previously made Cam (2018), a horror film about a camgirl whose online identity is stolen. Their work gravitates toward social horror with a feminist and tech-critical underpinning. This is not a pair making old-school gore for gore's sake. They are making horror as media critique. Goldhaber's politics are plainly progressive, but his craft is legitimate.Daniel Goldhaber made his feature debut with Cam (2018), which he co-wrote with Isa Mazzei (based on Mazzei's own experiences as a camgirl). The film was notable for treating its protagonist with genuine empathy while engaging critically with surveillance capitalism and online identity. Goldhaber subsequently directed How to Blow Up a Pipeline (2022), an eco-thriller based on Andreas Malm's manifesto about climate sabotage. That film was overtly political: it follows a group of activists bombing a pipeline to protest climate inaction. He is a skilled filmmaker with a left-wing political worldview that informs his subject matter. Bringing him to the Faces of Death property is an interesting choice. The 1978 original was apolitical exploitation. Goldhaber and Mazzei have turned it into something about misinformation and platform accountability.
Adult Viewer Insight
Conservative horror fans have real reasons to engage with this film. The horror genre at its best is conservative literature: death is real, choices have consequences, the abyss stares back. Goldhaber's platform critique can be read as an attack on corporate irresponsibility regardless of your politics. The film does not lecture you about gender or race. Its political content is about media and truth, which are concerns that cut across ideology. The progressive casting is visible from the marketing. Go in with open eyes and you'll find more to respect here than you might expect from the director of How to Blow Up a Pipeline.
Parental Guidance
Not rated. 18+ only. Graphic horror content, simulated death footage, psychological deterioration, strong language. Not appropriate for anyone under 18. Conservative adults should approach prepared for extreme content.
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