Motion Detected (2023)-- My take on the movie with spoilers!

 

Plot: When Eva moves into a home with a new security system, she experiences a weird phenomenon.

So you move into a new home, have an advanced security system installed, and realize it is glitching.

What would you do?

Call Customer Service? Great. When the agent shows up and explains how the system works, should you ask questions to make sure you understand everything about it? Yes.

Well, Eva thinks it's a good idea to only complain about the system and then not learn how to actually use it.

She literally meets the guy four to five times but doesn't bother to ask him to show her how everything is going to work.

MOTION DETECTED could have been an interesting horror movie, but it leaves you with more questions and no answers.

But that isn't the only thing not working for this movie.

The acting is subpar, the dialogues are awkward, and the pace languid. The ending is befuddled and lazy.

A movie that could have been along the lines of Paranormal Activity and M3GAN turns out to be a lackadaisical attempt to make a horror movie.

MOTION DETECTED Plot

We see a girl in her bedroom looking at something glitching in her room.  She ignores it and goes outside to play. She looks up and sees that glitchy thing again.

Where is her family? I have no idea.

This time, when she goes back to her room, this glitchy thing snatches her.

In the next scene, we see a realtor welcoming a couple into the house.

It's Eva and Miguel who are thrilled to own this new house with this super cool security system called the Diabolo. The only thing they are not impressed with is the realtor's pronunciation of the word.

The house is now theirs, and they are enjoying being a couple by taking a bath in separate tubs. Eventually, Eva notices that Miguel seems preoccupied with texts. She guesses that Miguel has some business back in Mexico City.

Eva is livid because Miguel has just arrived and not even unpacked yet. That was the whole point for Miguel, who didn't want to unpack because he was planning a business trip.

Eva tells him she doesn't even know how to work the alarm system yet, and Miguel assures her she will learn quickly.

She doesn't.

When he notices how complicated it can be for his wife, he has second thoughts, and we are given a hint about something that happened to Eva that resulted in the couple moving away from Mexico City.

Eva assures her husband she will be fine. He will only be gone five days, after all. Right?

Wrong again.

This is going to be Eva's story from here on.

Off Miguel goes, and Eva spends the first night, a little spooked. We see some glitching things around the house, but it has no significance.

The next morning, Eva wants to go for a run, but she is unable to set the alarm properly. Eventually, she gives up and just leaves the house without setting the alarm properly. She calls customer service and is put on hold forever.

Later, she is swimming when she spots someone standing in front of her. She is startled to see the security system agent finally showing up...in her backyard. He is busy ogling her but understands he's not supposed to show up in people's backyards just like that.

Eva complains about the system, but the agent is checking out her swimsuit. He finally decides to focus on the system and show off about how she can control everything with her phone, but Eva isn't impressed. Nor does she ask the agent to show how to properly work the security system.

He leaves, and Miguel calls Eva, and we get to hear some tacky dialogue about Eva being the one fire he can not put out, but he makes a flirtatious comment.

There's then a nosy neighbour roaming about and telling her about how the previous owners just disappeared.

Things in the house keep opening and closing on their own, and we see several shots of the security system keeping an eye on Eva. Her heart rate is being monitored, her body language, and even her nightmares.

At one point, the system is able to analyse her dreams and create the monster of her dreams.

What are her nightmares about? Eva keeps dreaming about the man who broke into her previous home and had her at knife point. That incident left her with PTSD for which she needs therapy.

Eva even contacts her therapist for help, but she doesn't take her concerns regarding anything about the house or previous owners, seriously.

The therapist doesn't want her to go back on medication, and neither does Eva. But she tells Eva that if she doesn't get it together, she may have to go on medication.

More things occur around the house that Eva thinks is inexplicable, like her favourite coffee cup breaking. When she checks the cameras later, she finds that the cup simply moved on its own.

She sees a glitchy girl on the staircase, but when she goes to the exact spot, there's nothing there.

When the agent comes again, he accidentally slips up about the girl being on camera. When Eva asks how he knows about a girl being the one she keeps seeing, the agent makes up a lame excuse about ghost girls and horror movies.

Not really.

He actually talks about how the camera is picking up the patterns of the old owners.

Eva sort of buys it but begins to look into the security system. When she posts online a problem regarding it, she immediately gets dozens of notifications about the Diabolo being the best security system there is.

Eva finally runs into the one character who is going to spill the beans.

The neighbour, Reed, looks at his wits end. He tells Eva about the dangers of the system and cuts his conversation short so he can leave an air of mystery and terror.

The next day, Eva learns from the neighbourhood watch website that Reed's house has burned down.

She begins to get paranoid, which gets worse because Miguel doesn't show up. He insists he sent a voicemail, but Diabolo deleted it.

Eva also doesn't text her husband or anything. She prepares dinner and even goes ahead to pour wine in glasses.

Of course, when he doesn't show up, Eva drinks from every bottle in the house and drinks.

Of course, her hallucinations take a weird turn, and she gets nightmares. Diabolo manifests from the nightmares and creates the very intruder who threatened her.

She gets freaked out, and when he goes away, she has another therapy session where her therapist advises her to go on medication.

Eva is against it, but clearly, she's beginning to wonder if she is hallucinating or not.

MOTION DETECTED Ending Explained

Miguel is finally on his way home and calls Eva with the news that the man who had broken into their house was killed. She has nothing to worry about.

Eva thinks she has plenty to worry about with the security system that left the refrigerator open and spoiled all her food and ice cream.

She decides to rip apart the cables when it's time for the climax to hit. Diabolo doesn't stay down. He is an advanced security system that has a back-up.

He manifests into the man who attacked Eva and terrorizes her. Just like in her nightmares, she is killed by him.

But morning comes, and Eva is fine.

Was it all a dream?

Miguel is back and calls out to her. Eva is standing right it front of him, but he doesn't see her. In fact, he goes right through her.

Eva is shocked to discover she has been sucked into Diabolo's security system and glitches.

The movie ends.

MOTION DETECTED is a clumsily made movie that tries too hard to be an intelligent thriller.

The security system that is supposed to be threatening and terrorising Eva turns out to be playing childish pranks by deleting voice calls and spoiling ice cream.

Almost like a jealous ex would behave.

Diabolo turns out to be petty rather than petrifying.

SCARE SCALE: