When you spend a lot of your time talking about, writing about, and reading about movies — and generally build your whole existence around them — it’s rare to see a film at your local cineplex that you weren’t expecting. While that last bit has been true more often than not, I’d be lying if I claimed to have been previously aware of Solo Mio or Bendito Corazón. But Redux Redux is different because it was a film relevant in my cinematic friend groups. It debuted at SXSW in 2025, and three of my friends saw it. Despite that, when it showed up at my local theater, I had no prior knowledge of it — and I’m really glad I went.
Irene Kelly’s (Michaela McManus) daughter was murdered, and she has killed her daughter’s murderer (played by Jeremy Holm)… but once wasn’t enough. Irene now travels across parallel universes, killing her daughter’s murderer again and again, risking her life and her humanity with each attempt. She seems content — or maybe just numb — to continue this pattern until she encounters Mia (Stella Marcus), who has been marked as the killer’s next victim.
If you’ve listened to the Bloody Awesome Movie Podcast over the years, you’ve probably heard me complain about films establishing rules and then failing to follow them. Redux Redux straddles that line. The rules of her parallel universe travel are mostly implied and inferred by the audience, but I’m left with plenty of questions. I’m not questioning whether what she’s doing is scientifically accurate — I’m very comfortable with make-believe. But when we remember that movies are constructed and every decision is deliberate, internal consistency matters.
Her travel between universes appears to happen within a set window of time. It’s never made fully clear whether that’s accurate, and it’s also difficult to determine how much time has passed between her daughter’s murder and her current state. We’re told she’s traveled to many universes in pursuit of revenge. Certain elements of her process imply she spends several days in each one. Has she aged? Does she age? These questions might sound pedantic, but they affect the believability of the plot.
And here’s what makes Redux Redux so impressive: these kinds of perceived rule violations often pull me completely out of a film. They can sour my entire experience. But I loved this movie despite those issues.
The premise is simply too compelling. It’s one that any parent can emotionally latch onto. If you knew your child had been murdered — and murdered in multiple universes — wouldn’t you want the person responsible to pay in all of them? Revenge stories are cautionary tales we both relate to and resist. This one loops that idea in a way that really nails the genre’s core theme: the erosion of our humanity in exchange for vengeance. If one act of revenge diminishes us, what happens if we keep doing it over and over again? For fans of revenge narratives, this feels fresh.
But it’s not just the story — it’s the two lead performances.
McManus is instantly compelling. The range of emotion on her face in the opening scenes alone makes the performance pop. As the audience is pulled deeper into her world, she grabs us by the collar and seems to say, “You’re coming with me, and you’re going to understand what drives me as if it happened to you.” And when Marcus enters the film, you’re even more invested. The chemistry between them is strong, but the narrative stakes surrounding them are even stronger. There’s no denying the beacon of humanity that Mia offers Irene — and by extension, us. Can humanity be pulled back from the darkest abyss and returned to the light? It’s a question many of us ask ourselves while doom-scrolling on our social media platform of choice.
Redux Redux was a dour yet pleasant surprise at the movies — a film that caught me off-guard as if I were part of Irene’s universe-hopping interventions. Maybe in another universe I saw this film at SXSW and it didn’t land for me there. But in this timeline, it absolutely did. Despite the many questions I still have about how the multiverse mechanics function, I have no doubts about one thing: I loved this movie.
Redux Redux is in select theaters now.
Rating: 4.5/5
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