#Bossbabe (2023) Review – Fantasia
Running a quick twelve minutes #Bossbabe, the new film from writer/director Kassy Gascho (The Phone Interview, Behind the Red Nose) is a skewering of influencer culture and multilevel marketing. It also has something to say about the lengths some people will go to for wealth and fame. And the lengths companies will go to exploit it.
Sofi (Katelyn Doyle, Sisterhood) is trying to expand her reach in the world of makeup marketing giant Bevlon. And what better way to do it than to throw a party? Bobbi (Pooja Bhandari, There Are No Children Here, Tonight, You Will Shine!), Lexi (Daisy Lankstead) and former child star Dani (Selena Goosney, Dream Job) are the first to show up.
But when one of them ends up dead decisions will have to be made between friendship and downlines. Nobody said being a #Bossbabe would be easy.
If you’ve ever had someone try to recruit you into one of the seemingly endless online pyramid schemes, excuse me multilevel marketing business opportunities, then you’ll recognize Sofi and her friends right away. Shallow, full of themselves, and faker than a hooker’s orgasm. Watching them trade platitudes with each other is equal parts humorous and nauseating, but it’s not until a dose of Bevlon Beauty Enhancer leaves one of them dead that things really get twisted as the who and why behind her death are revealed.
I don’t want to spoil it with details, but it’s a bit of genre parody that’s as amusingly over the top as the glasses the characters wear. Even more biting though are business-focused comments that it unleashes, including the funniest reference to a refund I’ve heard in ages. And, as the Bevlon representatives remind us anything can be forgiven, even murder, if it can be monetized.
#Bossbabe is a solid piece of satire that delivers its message without being obvious or preachy and is worth seeing if the chance presents itself. It made its world premiere at this year’s Fantasia, you can check the director’s website for announcements of future festival screenings.
