Unlocked (2023)

Unlocked turns a modern convenience into a quiet, creeping nightmare, and what makes it special is how plausibly it weaponizes the little device you trust with your whole life. Director Kim Tae-joon keeps the tension tight and intimate, letting dread build from everyday routines as Chun Woo-hee grounds the film with a performance that feels painfully human, while Yim Si-wan delivers a chillingly convincing villain who never needs to raise his voice to make your skin crawl. The pacing is brisk without feeling rushed, threading a cat-and-mouse vibe with a parallel investigation that keeps tightening the net. If you like thrillers that burrow under your habits and leave you side-eyeing your phone afterward, this one’s a smart, unnerving watch—though if you prefer escapism over anxiety, it may hit a little too close to home.

Unlocked wants to be a modern paranoia thriller about how a single lost phone can turn your whole life into an open book, and that premise is genuinely creepy in a very everyday way. The problem is it plays out in a fairly predictable, paint-by-numbers manner, with plot holes and convenient turns that can pull you out just when it should be tightening the screws. Character work is thin, so you may end up watching the mechanics of the story rather than feeling truly invested in the people inside it, and the tone can drift into dreary instead of suspenseful. If you’re here for a straightforward cat-and-mouse with a strong central performance and a timely fear of surveillance, it’s serviceable; if you want smart twists, airtight logic, or something that says anything new, this probably isn’t your best use of time.