STARRY EYES is one of those 'mumblegore' films set in the soulless world of the modelling industry. Watching it, the only thing that interested me was how similar the story is in tone to the later NEON DEMON, although this one's more graphic and distasteful. The main character is a waitress who aspires to become a model, so when she visits a new agency, you can guess the kind of thing that happens.Truth be told, I'm no big fan of this genre and STARRY EYES reminds me why. This is drawn-out and cheap, with unpleasant characters throughout and a lead you can hardly get behind due to her self-destructive drive. The horror tries very hard to shock but although unpleasant I didn't find it disturbing, merely juvenile in approach. In fact, the whole experience was rather depressing for me. If this is the face of modern horror, I'd rather do without it.

Comparing it to Rosemary's Baby??? Not even close! Rosemary's Baby had a plot, a REASON, an EXPLANATION, it made SENSE! This movie makes no sense. I'm only giving it 2 stars since it kept me watching until the end, hoping to make some sense out of it.At the beginning it seemed pretty good. Seemed like it was leading up to something interesting. But then it dragged on and on. Here's the spoiler: NOTHING HAPPENS. Other than the gory murders at the end. And some stupid cult yelling "Hail Astreaus!" (The subtitles misspelled the Greek God I think it was). Sort of like the slightly corny "Hail Satan!" at the end of Rosemary's Baby. Except in Rosemary's Baby they slowly let you learn about the cult, the people in it, what they were doing, what their origins were, and then let it all hang out in the end. Here, nothing. Just leads up to the end with a cult with no explanation, no background, nothing.If you like to see people's face get smashed into pulp with a dumbbell you can skip to close to the end. It's completely pointless. I don't mind seeing gore like that - I'd rather not - but if it has a point and a plot and makes sense then I don't mind.One little technical point. It's not that easy to stab someone to death. Especially a small girl stabbing a medium-size man. Normally they would fight back, not just sit there going "why?".One thing I will say is the lead actress Alex Essoe did an AMAZING job of acting, wow! She was a great actress, even acting being an actor. She was great. Too bad the rest of the movie was worthless.

I was intrigued the entire movie because I didn't know where it was going to go. I've done some reading about the Hollywood/Illuminati/eyes wide shut conspiracy theories and was curious how this film would depict the occult in Hollywood. The film did a good job portraying the sinister side, however it was a snap shot of the creepy behind the scenes devil worshippers and more of a character study as we watch Sarah transform. It was interesting to see LA filmed this way, very unglamorous and almost always overcast. This set an ominous tone throughout. Ever her friends, aspiring actors and film makers, living out of vans or piled into small apartments constantly drinking and hanging out. It was a rosy vision of life in La La Land. Overall a Slow burn, worth the watch, and some solid gore as well!

In Hollywood, the Big Taters'waitress Sarah Walker (Alex Essoe) is an ambitious aspiring actress that suffers from hair pulling disorder. Sarah does not respect her boss Carl (Pat Healy) or her job since she believes she will be a great actress and this job is temporary only to pay her bills. She shares an apartment with her roommate Tracy (Amanda Fuller) that frequently discloses her secrets to their selfish friends Erin (Fabianne Therese) that likes to humiliate Sarah and steal her roles; Danny (Noah Segan), who is an aspiring director that likes Sarah; Poe (Shane Coffey) and Ashley (Natalie Castillo) that are indifferent to her. When Sarah is invited to an audition of the film The Silver Scree from the company Astraeus Pictures, their auditioners do not show any reaction to her performance. When Sarah leaves the audition, she goes to the toilet room and has an attack, pulling her hair and crying. Immediately after, the casting director (Maria Olsen) invites her to return to the room and repeat what she did in the bathroom for her assistant (Marc Senter) and she. Sarah is invited again to an audition with the producer (Louis Dezseran) and when he insinuates to have sex with her, she refuses and goes home. However her ambition prevails and she returns to his house and has oral sex with him. He tells that she wants to be famous, she needs to die and reborn. When Sarah returns home, she finds that her body is deteriorating and she needs to murder her friends to complete her transformation. What will she do?"Starry Eyes" is a disturbing horror film with potential to be great. The story is a sort of gore version of Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray", where the body of the lead actress deteriorates instead of her body, with "Faust". Alex Essoe has a top-notch performance and the gore scenes are impressive. The plot has flaws, without any explanation about the cult or how the deaths could be explained to the police, families and landlords, maybe because of the low-budget. The conclusion does not show Sarah famous but she probably might be. My vote is six.Title (Brazil): Not Available on Blu-Ray or DVD.