Drop Movie Review

Drop (2025)

Rent Drop on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: Jillian Jacobs & Chris Roach
Directed by: Christopher Landon
Starring: Meghann Fahy, Brandon Sklenar, Violett Beane, Jeffery Self, Reed Diamond 
Rated: PG-13
Watch the trailer

Plot
Dating can be deadly. Violet's first date in years is upended by a series of phone drops presenting a sinister choice: kill her date or lose her child.

Verdict
This genre can only offer so much. From the beginning you have to buy into the premise that someone would create such an elaborate scheme and that second, they can pull it off as shown. This stretches the concept as far as it will go without getting repetitive until the final act. The big violent finale isn't as easy to forgive. It's mindless, attempting to provide some sort of conclusion. All it did was make me question if the movie was more or less mediocre than I previously thought.
Skip it.

Review
In a similar vein as Carry-on, our phones present an easy method of communication and control, especially when someone nefarious wants to push you into action.

The first scene is rough, showing Violet (Meghann Fahy) attacked by her husband. That adds tension to the next scene that's her first date in years at an expensive restaurant. She's a life coach, and you wonder if it's because of the abuse she suffered or a contrast to her experiences; what she tells people versus what's happened.

Meghann Fahy plays Violet

While waiting for her date, she begins getting text messages from "digiDROPS." While innocuous at first, we know what this movie is. At first the drops are memes about choices, then escalating to addressing Violet directly after her date Henry (Brandon Sklenar) arrives. Henry offers an explanation, but it's still odd. These memes are too good, too relevant. Then a drop urges her to check her home security camera where she sees someone has broken into her home. The drops order her not to tell anyone or ask for help. She agrees because her son's life is threatened.

The unseen assailant makes her look foolish, that's how these stories go. She has to explain away her preoccupation with her phone, bathroom trips, and odd behavior. This has to be multiple people, someone in the restaurant and at her home, but who? Why? Her date is an easy guess, he's almost too perfect. She suspects anyone in the restaurant with a phone which is everyone there. Could anyone create these messages so quickly, react to Violet's choices as they happen? You have to accept the concept.

Brandon Sklenar, Meghann Fahy play Henry, Violet

It's such an elaborate scheme. Violet is being used to kill someone. Is it a ruse? The threats to her son compel her to do absolutely anything. It starts simple and keeps getting more complicated as it pushes Violet to do increasingly more difficult tasks while hoping we're just along for the ride. I wonder how the assailant can do everything we see. I appreciate that once this stretches the plot nearly as far as it can go, the movie pivots to the big finale. It's a smart move, this genre can only do so much. This is interesting enough, but it can't sustain the momentum. The big finale is mindless violence just to put a cap on the story. While I was willing to suspend my disbelief for the concept, I found the finale even more unbelievable than the rest of the movie and unfortunately less satisfying.