Karen is a film that thinks naming its antagonist “Karen” is clever enough to excuse the rest. What unfolds is not a meaningful critique of white entitlement, but a clumsy parody of it — shallow, exaggerated.
Nothing is allowed to breathe. Not the performances, not the themes, not even the horror. Taryn Manning’s lead performance flails between caricature and camp, but the script never supports her. The victims are written as little more than props for the message — and that’s the biggest failure of all: a film about injustice that doesn’t even try to humanize the people it claims to defend.
Karen is a film that thinks naming its antagonist “Karen” is clever enough to excuse the rest. What unfolds is not a meaningful critique of white entitlement, but a clumsy parody of it — shallow, exaggerated.
Nothing is allowed to breathe. Not the performances, not the themes, not even the horror. Taryn Manning’s lead performance flails between caricature and camp, but the script never supports her. The victims are written as little more than props for the message — and that’s the biggest failure of all: a film about injustice that doesn’t even try to humanize the people it claims to defend.