Rosario Review
Rosario (2025) Film Review, a movie directed by Felipe Vargas, written by Alan Trezza and starring Emeraude Toubia, David Dastmalchian, Paul Ben-Victor, Emilia Faucher, José Zuniga, Nick Ballard, Diana Lein, Indhira Serrano and Guillermo Garcia.
Director Felipe Vargas pretty much reinvents creepy with the terrifying horror film, Rosario. As a midnight movie on a Saturday night, Rosario would probably be the most effective because it creates an eerie atmosphere of dread that feels like a nightmare come to life. This new picture can intrigue the viewer as it reveals its spooky plot details in a slow, but steady, manner until it ultimately rivals even the scariest of haunted house movies despite a few problematic detours along the way.
This film opens in 1999 with a young girl named Rosario Fuentes (Emilia Faucher) who secures a bond with her father, Oscar (the effective José Zúñiga), while coping with a mysterious encounter with her grandmother where a little bit of blood is unveiled. Flash forward to present day and Rosario is now played by the superb Emeraude Tobia. She’s working in New York City as a businesswoman, is dodging calls from her grandmother and has come into a couple of problems at work. She tells her doorman she can’t help him invest his money and then she faces a few speed bumps in her career. When there’s a snowstorm on the horizon, she is told through a phone call that her grandma has died. She must then travel to an outer borough to go to her grandma’s apartment and take care of the problem.
Rosario gets there and it’s not a pretty situation. Things get progressively worse as a weird tenant, Joe (the always interesting David Dastmalchian of Late Night with the Devil), demands back his air fryer that he lent Rosario’s grandmother. When Joe tries to get into the apartment where Rosario’s grandmother’s dead body lies, Rosario doesn’t let him in. Joe is just a small problem compared to the creepy crawlers on her grandma’s body and the fact that the police can’t get there quickly enough due to other calls and the weather.
We learn that Rosario’s grandmother has scars on her arms and was into an odd type of religion and also that she was an undocumented immigrant. Rosario’s first thought is that the grandma was into voodoo, but Rosario soon discovers the situation is far worse than she imagined. Rosario’s mom (Diana Lein) even shows up. However, when the mother starts calling Rosario selfish, we know something’s not right and that the otherworldly events occurring are part of a bigger family picture that involves the troubles the grandmother faced in her life and the devastating after effects of those trials and tribulations.
Rosario tries to leave the apartment, but when she does, there are no trains running and a cop yells at her from afar in the desolate train station. There’s no escape for Rosario and she will have to confront her past to find out what is really going on in the spirit world and/or the real world based upon a potential curse that was cast many years ago. When Oscar finally arrives, the plot comes full circle and will leave the audience frightened beyond a reasonable doubt.
There are some fine performances here. The younger and older Rosarios are perfectly conveyed by the actresses at hand. Emeraude Toubia is a revelation as she commands the audience’s attention right from the moment she appears on-screen. We want to tell Rosario what to do as she makes keen mistakes in the story line that are necessary for the plot to unfold the way it does. Rosario is great at her job, but all too willing to go to her grandmother’s apartment when, maybe, she should have waited for the storm to pass. But, even if she did wait, the secrets that are unveiled are nerve-wracking to watch and would have existed with or without the storm and the creepy apartment Rosario finds herself immersed in.
Rosario is a good horror film that knows when to reveal its major plot points. Paul Ben-Victor appears as another character in the building who helps progress the film’s story line. This movie ultimately feels like a haunted house movie with a message and is like a roller coaster ride as it sets its main character on a journey to hell that will frighten viewers to the core. This film could even make a decent double feature with Late Night with the Devil as well.
There are some flaws here. There is simply too much backstory which could lead some audience members to become frustrated when it comes to following every essential piece of the action. Also, the ending is way too open-ended for its own good. Still, the movie’s creepy apartment building setting is so effective that most horror fans will forgive the movie’s problems and focus on the riveting twists and turns and the powerful performance by Toubia who adds a significant amount of depth to her central role which will hopefully lead to more parts for her in horror movies such as this one. Toubia has arrived as a scream queen in a movie which is a bit smarter than the average horror film.
Rating: 7/10
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