Compare Girls Like Girls vs Backrooms

The two leads carry the film with expressive, emotionally grounded work, and even harsher reactions usually separate their performances from the script’s weaknesses. Supporting performances draw more mixed responses.

The performances are a major strength, with Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve repeatedly praised for grounding the surreal material in sadness, fear, and human vulnerability. A few critics noted accent or script limitations, but the acting consistently elevates thin passages.

The film is strongest during restrained exploration rather than overt action. Several reviewers criticized the third-act chase and explicit climax as overblown, generic, or less frightening than the slow build.

Age-appropriate casting helps the teenage emotions and awkwardness feel believable rather than overly polished.

The film connects most strongly with queer viewers, nostalgic millennials, and anyone who remembers the intensity of first love. Some viewers outside its core fan base may find the story too thin or inward-looking.

The movie should resonate most with liminal-horror fans, younger viewers, and audiences comfortable with ambiguity and slow-burn art horror. Conventional horror viewers may find it too opaque, quiet, or narratively unusual.

The computer-generated passages preserve the uncanny texture of the original web series and deliver strong visual impact. They blend with the physical sets while retaining a deliberately unreal quality.

Coley receives a clear grief-and-self-acceptance arc, while Sonya and several side characters often feel less fully explored. The imbalance leaves parts of the relationship emotionally convincing but narratively underwritten.

Clark and Mary have clear psychological wounds, but reviewers split on how fully the script develops them. Strong performances communicate more than the page, while motivations, supporting characters, and some late turns can feel thin.

The leads’ chemistry is usually the film’s strongest pull, especially in quiet looks, touches, and private moments. A minority found the spark too muted to justify the relationship’s pain.

Sunlit exteriors, intimate close-ups, and a hazy summer palette create a dreamy sense of longing. The look is widely admired, though some found the soft-focus style too uniform for heavier scenes.

Wide compositions, oppressive framing, found-footage perspectives, and carefully destabilizing camera movement make the endless rooms feel both enormous and claustrophobic. The camera often creates fear by making viewers question what they briefly saw.

Mid-2000s fashion details such as platform flip-flops and period styling reinforce the setting without feeling like costume-party shorthand.

The early-1990s costuming helps the cast feel naturally embedded in the period and supports the film’s analog atmosphere without drawing attention away from the setting.

Critical reactions lean positive but not unanimous, with praise for the performances and emotional sincerity balanced by complaints about thin plotting and uneven pacing.

Critical response is broadly enthusiastic about the craft and ambition but not unanimous. The movie’s opacity, slow pace, and narrative imbalance create a clear divide between admirers and skeptics.

The film treats queer teenage love as ordinary, specific, and worthy of a wide theatrical canvas. Its unapologetically sapphic focus is a major strength for viewers who rarely saw themselves centered in coming-of-age stories.

The dialogue ranges from natural, awkward teenage speech to lines described as stiff, cringey, or overly YA-styled. The quiet visual storytelling often works better than the spoken exchanges.

Dialogue is uneven: psychological exchanges can clarify the themes, but several reviewers found scenes mandatory, awkward, or unintentionally strange. The actors often make the lines work better than the script does.

Hayley Kiyoko shows a strong eye for intimacy, mood, and emotional detail in her feature debut. Reactions split over whether the music-video sensibility fully sustains a feature-length narrative.

Kane Parsons is widely praised for remarkably assured control of mood, spatial tension, and visual horror in his feature debut. Criticism centers on later over-explanation and a few overreaching narrative choices rather than his filmmaking instincts.

The editing can effectively capture glances, memory, and emotional shifts, but rapid cuts and montage-heavy passages sometimes rush key developments or blur the passage of time.

The editing helps move between polished cinematic framing and unstable found-footage passages while preserving disorientation. It is credited as part of the film’s distinctive overall craft.

The film’s strongest moments make first love, grief, rejection, and self-acceptance feel immediate and raw. Even mixed reactions often acknowledge that the central emotions land.

The film’s strongest passages turn the nightmare architecture into an emotionally coherent story about grief, isolation, and damaged memory. The sadness carried by the performances gives the abstract horror lasting weight.

The final resolution is divisive because the main cut to black can feel abrupt, while the post-credits scene supplies the romantic closure many viewers wanted. Staying through the credits materially improves the payoff.

The ending is the most divisive element. Some found the final image haunting, open-ended, or cathartic, while many called the climax anticlimactic, overly conventional, confusing, or obvious sequel bait.

Its warm atmosphere, emotional leads, and Pride-season appeal make it an enjoyable watch despite familiar plotting.

Supporters found the film engrossing, compulsively watchable, and memorable despite its austere style. More skeptical viewers still considered it solid, but its vibe-driven structure limits broad entertainment appeal.

The adaptation preserves the music video’s visual DNA, emotional core, and fan callbacks while condensing or changing several book elements. The removal of the original assault is widely welcomed.

The adaptation preserves the web series’ analog textures, liminal unease, found-footage language, and open mystery while expanding the concept into a feature. One reviewer wished the entire movie had stayed in found-footage form.

As a queer coming-of-age romance, it delivers tenderness, yearning, heartbreak, and self-discovery even when it follows familiar genre beats.

As liminal and experimental horror, the film delivers an intense, disturbing, and unusually cerebral experience. It is less satisfying for viewers expecting a conventional monster movie or a steady stream of crowd-pleasing scares.

Playful moments and awkward teenage behavior provide welcome relief from the grief and romantic turmoil.

Small moments of knowing humor and absurd dialogue keep the film from becoming overly solemn. The comedy is generally restrained, though some viewers felt it occasionally reduced the scares.

Maya da Costa gives the film its emotional center with restrained body language, wounded intensity, and a believable progression from guarded grief to self-possession.

Chiwetel Ejiofor gives Clark wounded anger, obsession, and maniacal intensity while remaining emotionally legible. Reviewers widely praised his commitment, even when the character’s motivations or dialogue were less convincing.

The film’s clearest message is that self-acceptance and healthy love begin with believing you are worthy of both. Its queer representation is framed through ordinary human longing rather than spectacle.

The film turns abandoned retail and office spaces into an anxiety about isolation, lost communal life, and a world becoming increasingly artificial. That cultural reading gives the liminal imagery relevance beyond simple creepiness.

The core plot is familiar and rarely surprising, but the specific queer perspective, personal history, and mid-2000s setting give it a distinct emotional identity.

Reviewers consistently describe the film as visually distinctive, culturally timely, and unlike most mainstream horror. Even detractors recognize the freshness of turning internet-born liminal imagery into a large-scale cinematic world.

The deliberate, slow-burn rhythm works for viewers who enjoy lingering mood and emotional detail. Others find the montages, dead air, and rushed late developments an uneven combination.

The deliberate slow burn gives the eerie spaces room to work and builds heavy dread for patient viewers. Others felt the sparse middle stretches, long explorations, or lack of narrative drive became simply slow.

The story is simple and easy to follow, centering Coley’s growth more than the fate of the romance.

The film intentionally withholds answers, and that ambiguity can be intriguing and discussion-provoking. It also frustrates viewers when lore becomes either too opaque or too heavily explained, especially late in the story.

The film follows a recognizable summer-romance and coming-of-age structure, with few major surprises or unconventional turns.

Large physical sets and practical distortions give the Backrooms convincing texture and scale. The handcrafted elements were praised as visually precise and central to the film’s uncanny realism.

AIM windows, Sidekicks, iPods, CDs, bedrooms, and small-town hangouts make 2006 feel lived-in and emotionally specific. The period detail is one of the most consistently praised elements.

The vast yellow labyrinth is the clearest consensus standout, praised as tactile, uncanny, claustrophobic, and often the film’s real star. Physical sets, warped furniture, and impossible architecture turn bland commercial spaces into nightmare imagery.

The awkward glances, mixed signals, and queer uncertainty often feel authentic and lived-in. A few stylized or scripted moments undercut that naturalism.

Committed performances and tactile sets make the impossible setting feel emotionally and physically believable. The characters’ reactions help anchor the increasingly abstract nightmare.

Its emotional warmth and representation inspired at least one strong desire to watch it again, especially among viewers connected to the original song and video.

The layered imagery, unresolved lore, and thematic details give the film strong repeat-viewing potential for viewers on its wavelength. Its mysteries invite reconsideration after the first viewing.

The central romance is tender, volatile, and emotionally recognizable, with strong moments of yearning and intimacy. Some viewers wanted more dialogue, development, or chemistry before the heartbreak intensified.

At roughly 95 minutes, the film can paradoxically feel both stretched in its quieter passages and too compressed in its dramatic transitions.

At roughly 110 minutes, the film was described as brisk by one reviewer despite its deliberate internal pace. Its length gives the spaces room to breathe without making the feature feel oversized.

The film favors sustained unease, hidden threats, and carefully placed shocks over constant jump scares. Many found it deeply creepy or terrifying, though several felt the later monster reveals and action made it less frightening.

The moody score and era-aware musical cues deepen the film’s wistful tone and emotional beats without overwhelming the story.

The eerie ambient score blends into the fluorescent hum and feels as though it emerges from the Backrooms itself. Its restrained, insidious textures support dread without overpowering the imagery.

The screenplay has genuine sensitivity and several strong emotional ideas, but it often relies on familiar structure, thin side characters, and abbreviated development.

The screenplay earns praise for economical exposition, psychological ideas, and character interiority in its best passages. Its weaker sections rely on clunky explanations, uneven dialogue, and late lore that can flatten the mystery.

The restrained approach to physical intimacy is viewed as appropriate and refreshingly non-exploitative.

Ambient outdoor sound and intimate sonic detail can be immersive, though one reaction criticized the music mix for becoming too loud.

Fluorescent hums, metallic groans, distant impacts, and muted ambient noise make the environment physically oppressive. The soundscape is repeatedly cited as essential to the film’s tension and spatial dread.

Period needle drops and queer artists give the soundtrack strong nostalgic and emotional appeal. The music feels carefully chosen rather than used as a greatest-hits showcase.

The creatures and distorted figures are designed to look unnerving rather than conventionally polished. Their impact is strongest when partially hidden; clearer views sometimes make them feel less scary.

The story is emotionally sincere and easy to connect with, especially through Coley’s grief and self-worth arc. Its main limitation is a familiar, sometimes underdeveloped narrative framework.

The premise and atmosphere are stronger than the conventional narrative holding them together. Some reviewers found the story emotionally coherent and compelling, while others saw an underbaked framework stretched around a powerful visual concept.

The supporting cast has warm individual moments, but thinly written roles limit their impact and leave the film heavily dependent on the leads.

The supporting cast adds mystery and credibility, with Mark Duplass repeatedly singled out for a memorable cryptic presence. Smaller roles generally strengthen the world without distracting from the central pair.

AIM exchanges and romantic uncertainty create localized tension, but the larger conflict is often too abstract or underdeveloped to sustain strong suspense.

Long corridors, distant noises, hidden figures, and unstable camera movement sustain a persistent sense of danger. Reviewers repeatedly praised the film for making anticipation and uncertainty more frightening than overt attacks.

The film meaningfully connects queer self-acceptance, grief, parental wounds, and the need to choose healthier love. Its emotional themes are deeper than its simple plot suggests.

The strongest interpretations connect the Backrooms to memory, grief, loneliness, self-deception, and destructive emotional loops. Most found meaningful psychological substance, though some thought the metaphors were underdeveloped or overwhelmed by atmosphere.

The wistful, intimate mood remains remarkably steady, avoiding both excessive melodrama and sugary sentimentality.

The oppressive, horrific tone is highly effective for most of the runtime. A few later explanations, jokes, or monster images disrupt the trance and make the final stretch feel sillier or more conventional.

The decision to remove the original music video’s homophobic assault is seen as a thoughtful improvement that keeps the focus on emotional growth rather than physical trauma.

The movie relies more on dread than gore, but its limited grim and gruesome shocks provide enough intensity for viewers who want some bloody payoff without constant graphic violence.

The warm, colorful, close-up-heavy style creates a strong dreamlike identity. Some viewers find the nostalgic orange haze heavy-handed or insufficiently varied.

The mix of harsh yellow lighting, analog textures, found footage, forced perspective, and surreal spatial design gives the film a distinctive identity. Reviewers admired how ordinary rooms become both familiar and deeply wrong.

The small-town spaces, early internet culture, and mid-2000s objects create a convincing social world shaped by isolation, nostalgia, and closeted desire.

The feature expands the web-series mythology without fully closing off its mysteries, giving established fans many connections and newcomers a workable entry point. Some reviewers felt the late lore and Easter eggs became overbuilt.