Yellow Eyes (2026) Review: Korman's Eerie Vision

Nena Martins stars as Julia, who, along with her husband Brad (Michael Kunicki), inherits a sprawling, dusty house from a relative she barely knew. Exciting, right? Not so fast. Tucked away in the cobwebbed corners is a mysterious relic - one of those “definitely don’t touch this” artifacts that immediately gets touched. Turns out, said relic is hosting the spirit of a super-powered demon, and it doesn’t take long for it to leap into poor Brad, possessing him and turning him into a moody, sleep-deprived shadow of himself.

The rest of the plot follows Julia’s frantic search for an exorcist to save her husband’s soul. She crosses paths with Ronnie (Jimmy Chung), a skeptical but helpful guide, a cryptic figure known as The Doctor (William Derrick III), and Margo O’Donnell’s Lana, who might know more than she’s letting on. There’s also a classic “warning from the grave” presence in the form of Joette Waters’ Gretchen, who shows up long enough to say the usual spooky housewife stuff. The stakes are high, the demon is mean, but the journey to the climax is paved with repetitive chases and whispered exposition.

Let’s start with the good stuff. Director Jesse Korman clearly knows how to frame a shot. There are a few moments of genuine visual dread - shadows that stretch wrong, the title creature’s glowing peepers peeking out from corners, and a genuinely unsettling sequence in a basement that had me leaning forward. The sound design is also doing heavy lifting; the low-frequency hums and distorted whispers create an atmosphere that the dialogue often fails to match.

The cast does what they can with the material. Nena Martins is committed as the terrified wife, and she runs the emotional gamut from “concerned” to “full-blown panic” with admirable energy. Michael Kunicki, however, is stuck playing the possessed husband with a performance that oscillates between “constipated” and “mildly annoyed,” which is a shame because his transformation should be the film’s centerpiece. He never quite reaches that “scary evil” echelon; he’s more like a guy who missed his morning coffee and is mad about it.

The real problem is the pacing. At 86 minutes, this should fly by, but it drags like a two-hour slog. Julie spends way too much time wandering the house, whispering “Brad? Brad, are you okay?” while Brad sits in a chair and breathes heavily. The middle act is a repetitive loop of “find someone who might help,” “they say no,” “weird vision,” “repeat.” The exorcism itself, when it finally arrives, feels rushed and underwhelming, lacking the theatrical chaos that makes the sub-genre fun.

And then there’s the script. Oh boy. The dialogue is clunky, full of exposition dumps where characters explain the plot to each other as if they’re reading from the back of the DVD case. There’s a scene where Ronnie explains the relic’s history in a single breath that feels like a Wikipedia summary. It’s the kind of writing that would make an audience groan, and it kills any momentum the visuals manage to build.

Pros

• Genuinely effective atmosphere and sound design.
• A few standout creepy visual moments (the shadows are MVP).
• Nena Martins gives a full-hearted, earnest performance.
• Runs a lean 86 minutes, so the hurting isn’t prolonged.

Cons

• Pacing is glacial in the middle act.
• Lead possession performance lacks menace or range.
• Clunky, expository dialogue that spells everything out.
• Predictable jump scares that mostly fizzle.
• The climax feels rushed and anticlimactic.

Yellow Eyes is a textbook case of wasted potential. It’s a movie that knows what it wants to be - a classic, moody possession thriller - but fumbles the execution. The production values are solid, and there’s a clear passion behind the camera, but the screenplay’s laziness and the painfully repetitive middle act sink the whole thing. You’ll find yourself checking the runtime more than your popcorn.

If you’re desperate for a new horror fix and you’ve exhausted every other streaming option, maybe give it a shot on a rainy afternoon. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you. This demon didn’t need an exorcist; it needed a script doctor. And maybe a better acting coach for its main possession. Save your money for something with a bit more bite - or, you know, just re-watch The Exorcist again. It’s still better. Much better.