‘Control Freak’ Review: Kelly Marie Tran Steals The Show In New Hulu Horror
Obsessive-compulsive disorder is more than hand-washing and checking locks. It’s a complex disorder I’ve lived with for most of my life that hides inside the folds of my brain, whispering untruths, peppering my mind with violent intrusive thoughts, and propelling me into self-induced spirals of panic. My coping mechanisms can be destructive, from ripping off my nails to drinking too much, and it sometimes felt like nothing I did could keep those voices at bay. And I’ve never seen that struggle so beautifully and horrifically rendered than in Shal Ngo’s new film, Control Freak, which comes to Hulu on March 14, 2025.
Ngo adapted the feature script from his short film Control featured in season two of Hulu’s Bite Size Halloween series. Here, he’s taken his initial core idea and created Val (Kelly Marie Tran), a rising star in the world of self-help, a motivational speaker who’s helped countless people lose weight, quit smoking cigarettes, and more. Her entire schtick is about controlling your most base impulses to make you a better you. Only then can you be happy, or so she says.
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She’s weeks away from launching her international speaking tour, she’s married to the guy of her dreams (Miles Robbins), they live in a massive house, and everyone seems to love her. It’s everything a girl could want, right? Except for one little thing: she has an itch. A persistent one. One that constantly tickles the back of her head, a nagging sensation that begs to be scratched. But no matter how much she scratches, the itch won’t go away. In fact, it’s been bothering her for 11 months.
As the itch persists, she receives a letter from her estranged father, demanding she honor her mother on the upcoming anniversary of her mother’s death. As the past she’s been running from begins to reappear, Val reluctantly decides to dive into her past to understand if the itch is more than just an irritating sensation. What she reveals was born from hatred during the Vietnam War and has infected her bloodline for decades.
But as she begins to reconnect with her past and understand the traumas in her childhood, her grip on reality seems to slip. As the tour approaches, she becomes distant from her husband and publicity team, hiding her increasingly bloody scalp under a hat, and avoiding any questions about anything other than the tour. Val falls into a self-destructive spiral as reality as she knows it seems to shift and nothing truly feels real anymore.
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On paper, the plot feels like any other meditation on intergenerational trauma or entry into the canon of films about highly successful women who lose their minds as they’re on the verge of success. But Ngo works to forge his own path with a film imbued with a heavy sense of tragedy. This isn’t just a film about strained parental relationships; it’s one about how war and tragedy on a massive scale permeate everything, even decades later. He isn’t afraid to use shockingly upsetting imagery to really strengthen the impact of Val’s experience. There’s love and care poured into this film’s script that’s apparent in every frame, which further strengthens the film’s impact with each bloody beat.
Carrying that script is a feral Kelly Marie Tran, who brings Val to life with so much empathy, care, and rage. While her experience is singular, Ngo and Tran worked together to also make it feel universal, especially for those of us who struggle with anxiety and obsessive-compulsive behaviors. Tran balances manufactured poise with sincere desperation in a performance that keeps you in its grasp until the credits start to roll.
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As I mentioned in this review’s introduction, Control Freak is, whether purposefully or not, a surprisingly accurate representation of living with the intrusive thoughts that often come with having OCD. Val thinks she’s learned to control those voices, keeping them at bay through precise rituals that must be followed to the letter. But as anyone who lives with OCD knows, those rituals are quite often life-ruining, forcing you into obsessive thought patterns that consume you until you can complete the said ritual. Val’s itching is that ritual, a replacement for cigarettes and junk food, a compulsion personified into something much more terrifying.
The biggest detriment to such a gnarly yet poignant story is its pacing which starts and stops too often to give Control Freak a true sense of momentum. It’s great that Ngo is unafraid to keep the bad things rolling throughout the film instead of concentrating them all at its end, but when the action screeches to a halt, it’s more difficult to get back into the story. This happens more than once here and it’s jarring, to say the least. While Ngo does always make sure to ramp up the tension again, it takes a bit to get there in a way that drags the film down.
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While this is a great film about mental illness, it also creates an incredible monster that’s rendered both digitally and practically throughout the film. Ngo chooses the recurring imagery of ants to shape a being that is ready to consume Val. Something so small and inconsequential as a single ant becomes a terrifying nightmare.
While the pacing stutters into a shocking and disturbing third act, Control Freak is a welcome change of pace for horror as Ngo examines familiar tropes of mental illness from a unique lens not often seen in the genre. With a focus on Vietnamese folklore and the experience of being Vietnamese in America, Control Freak takes the idea of “the crazy lady” protagonist and crafts something more upsetting than you may expect. Kelly Marie Tran is truly a star and hopefully this marks the beginning of more horror performances to come for the actor. She’s a modern scream queen in the making.
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Control Freak (2025)
Summary
While the pacing stutters into a shocking and disturbing third act, Control Freak is a welcome change of pace for horror as Ngo examines familiar tropes of mental illness from a unique lens not often seen in the genre.
Categorized: Reviews
