Set in present quarantine times, this movie may hit close to home to anyone who has experienced the horrors and feelings of violation from the dreaded…”Zoom bombers” (people who unexpectedly interrupt other peoples’ Zoom meetings). Written and directed by Michael Strode, Full Disclosure (2020) is a short movie that turns this ordinary event from contemporary everyday life and puts a horror spin on it, turning a video call into the last call for some unlucky friends.

Nine friends meet for a video hangout session when their conference call is interrupted by an uninvited guest. Dressed in a plague-doctor costume of the 17th century, the stranger types out rules — 1. you cannot hang up the call, 2. you cannot leave your camera frame, and 3. you cannot contact outside parties for help. The costumed bomber soon proves just how serious these rules must be followed, as those who do not follow the directions begin disappearing and the sinister games that lead to shocking revelations begin.

Full Disclosure turned out to be one of those movies that deals with the shoddy and precarious ties we have to our so-called friends, and how one outside person reveals how horrible we are to the very people we allow into our lives. It is not necessarily an original idea, as it is something one can find in I Know What You Did Last Summer and Samuel Goldwyn Films’ recent release Triggered (read our review here), though Full Disclosure is a snack version of these young adult horror features, with a short runtime and a shortness of horror.

The acting is okay, if not for the inauthentic and forced dialogue. The movie attempts to add some fear with creepy flashes of an unknown being, coupled with sounds of distortion to create a jumpscare effect, but it doesn’t quite land its intended impact, and the acting does not sell the seriousness and fear that should be produced from this situation with seemingly no way out.

Because it is shot as a video call, the film is allowed to get away with little actual direction, and something memorable or exciting or some clever camerawork to capture something scary was needed. Full Disclosure is just okay for a short movie, there is both nothing terrible about it yet nothing to write home about either. At the very least, director Michael Strode successfully created a genre of his own — Zoom-meeting horror.

MOVIE RATING – 6 out of 10