Boldly opening with an 8 minute monologue to her therapist, Joey (Olivia Taylor Dudley) gives the full backstory of her brief fling with a tracksuit-wearing alien, Brian (Lou Taylor Pucci), who promised to save earth from climate change before the increasingly rough inter-species intercourse (read: tentacle fucking) drove her to the home of her gay best friend Craig (Jordan Gavaris) five years ago.
Five years later, on the same day Joey randomly runs into Brian again, the two unemployed roommates are faced with a home repair neither can afford. With few remaining options the two decide to accept Brian’s invite to a weekend meditation retreat to clear their minds before tackling the nightmare their bathroom has become.
Both Joey and Craig are quickly seduced by Brian’s mysterious charisma and his shirtless hip hop dancing-based meditation. Enraptured by the cross species intercourse (as Brian continuously calls it) the two quickly descend into desperate, pitched competition for his affections, happily ignoring his aggressive, even murderous, tendencies.
Hold on, back up… tentacle sex?
TOUCH ME is a campy, neon soaked exploration of toxic relationships, childhood trauma, and horny tentacle sex, the latest film from writer and director Addison Heimann. Met with mixed reviews at Sundance, the film firmly belongs in the midnight slot of your favorite genre film festival and will not be for everyone. I did mention the copious amounts of tentacle sex, right? Despite the raunchy, attention-grabbing conceit, TOUCH ME is a fun and surprisingly touching film in which Heimann and the cast explore the relational and therapy-speak filled themes through a decidedly millennial sense of humor and snark.
Performances from the leads and supporting cast are strong and suitably quirky. Comedic timing is on point and there’s an authentic chemistry throughout as the tale grows weirder and Brian’s true mission is slowly revealed.
Scrappy, effective filmmaking
The film pushes the boundaries of their budget, limiting locations and cast in order to do their practical, puppeted effects justice — an ambitious endeavor for a film with more severed hands than the Star Wars franchise and nearly as many alien interactions. All in all, the effects mostly work and when they don’t, it honestly just adds to the camp in the best way possible. Paired with bold, at times giallo-inspired, cinematography, the film is a visual delight that supports the humorous tone by artfully contrasting it.
In fact, the film consistently shines when it revels in its campiness or live-action hentai. On the flip side, the few moments where it attempts a serious tone, replete with competitive trauma dumping and far too many references to molestation, serve only to drag the pacing, and the film, down.
Our take?
Horny, amusing, and surprisingly poignant at times, it’s clear the cast and crew were firing on all cylinders. This is perhaps most obvious in the film’s goopy climax as Brian’s true form is finally revealed in a starkly lit, perfectly puppeted, and humorously cathartic scene. Art house fare this is not, but if you’re looking for a junky midnight snack then grab your Red Vines, dim the lights (or hell, change them to a dark red and blue) and settle in for an entertaining 100 minutes that will leave you both wanting more and questioning your life choices.
TOUCH Me was screened and reviewed as part of our SXSW 2025 coverage.
Kev is a member of the Fantastic Fest features programming team, an aspiring screenwriter, and a seasoned marketing copywriter. They are a passionate champion of festival midnighters and loves to amplify the voices of underserved filmmakers — the weirder their films, the better.
