Nina Kiri
Evy Babic
Overview
The host of a popular paranormal podcast becomes haunted by terrifying recordings mysteriously sent her way.
Cast
12 people
Reviews
4 min read AI-generated editorial review
The Sound of Something Breathing Behind You
I’ve spent the last few days trying to shake Undertone—not because it’s terrifying in the way a jump scare is, but because it’s terrifying in the way a whisper in an empty room is. You don’t see the thing that’s wrong. You just feel it. And then you realize the feeling isn’t going away.
Ian Tuason’s film is a horror movie that understands something fundamental about fear: it’s not what you see, but what you hear when you’re alone. The premise is simple—Evy (Nina Kiri), the host of a paranormal podcast, starts receiving mysterious audio recordings that seem to document a haunting in real time. At first, they’re just eerie. Then they’re impossible. Then they’re inside her house. Then they’re inside her.
What makes Undertone work isn’t the plot (which is, admittedly, thin) or the scares (which are few and far between). It’s the way Tuason weaponizes sound. The film is a masterclass in audio design, turning silence into a character and noise into a weapon. There’s a moment early on where Evy listens to one of the recordings—a woman’s voice, distorted, repeating the same phrase over and over. The camera stays on Kiri’s face as she leans into her headphones, her expression shifting from curiosity to unease. The recording isn’t just playing for us. It’s playing for her. And then, suddenly, the sound cuts out. The silence that follows is worse than anything that came before it.
This is where Undertone reveals its true ambition. It’s not just a haunted house story. It’s a story about the horror of being heard—and the even greater horror of being ignored. Evy’s podcast is called Undertone for a reason. It’s about the things we whisper under our breath, the things we say when we think no one is listening. The recordings she receives are like that—messages from the other side, yes, but also messages from the parts of ourselves we try to bury. The film’s genius is in making those whispers feel personal. By the time the entity starts speaking to Evy in her own voice, it’s not just scary. It’s intimate.
I’ve spent the last few days trying to shake Undertone—not because it’s terrifying in the way a jump scare is, but because it’s terrifying in the way a whisper in an empty room is. You don’t see the thing that’s wrong. You just feel it. And then you realize the feeling isn’t going away.
Ian Tuason’s film is a horror movie that understands something fundamental about fear: it’s not what you see, but what you hear when you’re alone. The premise is simple—Evy (Nina Kiri), the host of a paranormal podcast, starts receiving mysterious audio recordings that seem to document a haunting in real time. At first, they’re just eerie. Then they’re impossible. Then they’re inside her house. Then they’re inside her.
What makes Undertone work isn’t the plot (which is, admittedly, thin) or the scares (which are few and far between). It’s the way Tuason weaponizes sound. The film is a masterclass in audio design, turning silence into a character and noise into a weapon. There’s a moment early on where Evy listens to one of the recordings—a woman’s voice, distorted, repeating the same phrase over and over. The camera stays on Kiri’s face as she leans into her headphones, her expression shifting from curiosity to unease. The recording isn’t just playing for us. It’s playing for her. And then, suddenly, the sound cuts out. The silence that follows is worse than anything that came before it.
This is where Undertone reveals its true ambition. It’s not just a haunted house story. It’s a story about the horror of being heard—and the even greater horror of being ignored. Evy’s podcast is called Undertone for a reason. It’s about the things we whisper under our breath, the things we say when we think no one is listening. The recordings she receives are like that—messages from the other side, yes, but also messages from the parts of ourselves we try to bury. The film’s genius is in making those whispers feel personal. By the time the entity starts speaking to Evy in her own voice, it’s not just scary. It’s intimate.
Audience Opinions
AI summary of viewer review patterns
Audience 5.8/10 AI
"A bold, sound-driven horror experiment that delivers immersive dread but splits opinion with its slow pace and low-key, ambiguous finale."
Sound design and atmosphere dominate the experience, with intricate audio work, subtle noises, and an oppressive sense of dread that many found genuinely frightening, especially on good speakers or headphones. Nina Kiri’s near one-woman performance is widely seen as committed and engaging, yet the sparse plot, very gradual build, and an ending that either feels abrupt or emotionally muted leave a significant portion of viewers underwhelmed.
What viewers praise
- Exceptional sound design Intricate, immersive audio and clever use of silence create tension and unease in almost every scene.
- Engrossing lead performance Nina Kiri convincingly carries the story almost alone, keeping a single-location setup engaging.
- Sustained creeping tension Emphasis on constant dread over jump scares gives the horror a lingering, uncomfortable feel.
- Inventive horror concept The focus on cursed recordings and podcast-style storytelling feels fresh and distinct from typical haunted-house setups.
Common complaints
- Very slow burn Long stretches of setup and minimal on-screen action make the film feel uneventful for those expecting a more dynamic horror ride.
- Divisive ending The finale comes off to many as abrupt, underpowered, or too ambiguous after such a long build-up.
- Thin narrative depth The story and character work are often seen as too slight or repetitive compared with the richness of the sound design.
- Uneven payoff of scares Some viewers find the strongest and scariest material packed into the last section, making earlier tension feel like it never fully pays off.
Recommended for
Slow-burn horror fans Audio-focused horror enthusiasts Atmospheric single-location thrill seekers Nina Kiri admirers Experimental A24-style horror crowd
Full Plot (Spoilers)
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Buzz & Rumors
Public reports AI-researched entertainment notes
UNDERTONE (2026): The Haunting Real-Life Drama Behind A24’s Quietly Messed-Up Horror Hit
TEASER: Think Undertone is scary? Wait till you hear what was going on outside the frame. From a director drinking his way through grief, to a set people swear was actually haunted, to fan wars over whether the “demon” is just unresolved trauma — this movie’s real-life backstory is juicier than any EVP tape.
On-Set Hauntings & Ghostly Theft
- Director Ian Tuason didn’t just make a haunted-house movie — he shot it in his own childhood home, the same Toronto house where he cared for both of his terminally ill parents before they died. The entire film was done on a micro-budget (around $500,000), with roughly a third funded from his own drained bank account and inheritance
.
- Tuason told Variety that while filming, the house “got haunted,” and he had to live in it during production, admitting he was never really comfortable in there even as he got “desensitized” to the vibes
.
IGInstagram·This horror film set was actually haunted… https://www.instagram.com/reel/DVzelvTkghE/Loading Instagram post…
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DVzelvTkghE/- On social media, interviewers pressed him on rumors that the Undertone set was “a little bit haunted.” Tuason didn’t give a firm yes or no — just coy talk about “weird things happening on set,” which of course only made fans more convinced something supernatural was lurking in the walls [5]
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- The creepiest flex of all: Tuason openly bragged in a horror press interview that he “stole from a ghost.” He used real EVP recordings in the movie’s soundscape — including dialogue ripped from a famous “haunted Toys R Us” ghost recording and other alleged paranormal audio . Those whispers you hear? Some of them came from actual ghost-hunting tapes.
Director in Crisis: Booze, Grief & Catharsis
- Behind the ultimate horror-movie tough guy act, Tuason was apparently falling apart. In a deeply personal profile, he admits he was drinking while writing the script, using alcohol to get through the “darkness” of caring for his dying parents and turning that emotional fallout into Evy’s story [2].
- After finishing the script, he got sober and embraced what he calls “radical honesty” with his producers and crew — basically confessing how rough his headspace had been, then opening the project up to more collaboration and rewrites. According to him, the movie got better once he stopped pretending he was fine [2].
- At the end of the film, the credits drop a gut-punch of a dedication: a long, raw message to “Mom and Dad from March 2021 to October 2023, when their bodies and minds slowly surrendered to the world,” describing how those 30 months taught him everything he knows about peace, courage, and existence [6]. For a movie about cursed audio, that might be the real scream.
Romance Rumors: Nina Kiri & Adam DiMarco Audio-Flirt?
- Front-facing scream queen Nina Kiri (Evy) and offscreen voice-only king Adam DiMarco (Justin) have sparked unconfirmed dating rumors thanks to their suspiciously flirty press energy. An industry news item about their interview tour even highlighted “romance speculation” between the pair while they promoted Undertone together
.
- Remember: DiMarco is never actually seen in the movie — we only hear him through headphones. But in interviews and festival appearances, fans noticed serious chemistry. A viral clip on social media joking that “the ghost is a fan of The White Lotus and just wanted to say hi” (a wink at DiMarco’s role on that show) showed the two laughing and vibing together, fueling shipper fantasies in the comments
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- For now, it’s all fan speculation — no hand-holding pap shots, no red-carpet confirmations. But the fandom already treats them like the horror world’s favorite disembodied situationship.
Fan Theory Bloodbath: Demon Baby or Mental Breakdown?
- On Reddit and horror forums, Undertone has become a full-blown theory battleground. One mega-thread, “the undertone Theory (Updated),” lays out a detailed case that there’s no demon at all — it’s Evy’s psychosis after a miscarriage and her mother’s death .
- Evidence cited:
- We only ever see things through Evy’s POV.
- A neatly made bed and an urn in the living room late in the film are treated as clues that her mother is already dead.
- The house’s chaotic crayon-covered look in the final walkthrough is read as the “true” state of the home breaking through Evy’s delusions [8].
- Team Supernatural, meanwhile, points to the film’s use of the demon Abyzou — a folkloric entity blamed for miscarriages — and to the creepy backwards nursery rhymes (“Lick the blood off,” etc.) discussed by Tuason in interviews about his sound design . Add in the use of real EVP, and they insist: the hauntings are canonically real [4][7].
- One especially spicy fan theory insists Justin himself might not exist — he’s just a comforting voice Evy invented to cope with her isolation [8]. No wonder the comment sections are carnage.
The Power Move: He Manifested the A24 Deal
- As if he wasn’t already living in a horror movie, Tuason apparently called his own fairy-tale ending. In a behind-the-scenes EPK filmed before the movie sold, he flat-out predicted that Undertone would be bought by either A24 or Neon for a mid–seven-figure sum [2].
- Cut to July 2025: after a buzzy Fantasia premiere and a bidding war, A24 swoops in and buys the film for exactly that range — reportedly the biggest acquisition of a Canadian film in history [2]. The EPK footage of him manifesting the deal now belongs to A24, which feels like the most on-brand horror-movie twist imaginable.
- The cherry on top? Thanks to Undertone’s success and its audio-driven scares, Tuason has been tapped to direct Paranormal Activity 8 — a theatrical relaunch of the found-footage franchise that heavily inspired his cursed recordings in the first place [3]. From haunted family home to Hollywood ghost factory: not a bad upgrade.
Entertainment rumors and trivia aggregated from public reporting. Treat speculation as unverified unless a cited source confirms it.
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