A young man’s past demons send him on a downward spiral in this LGBTQ psychological horror film from Addison Heimann.

Will is a young man who works as a potter and is in a great relationship for Luke. Things have been really great for him. However, underneath the surface, he has a dark secret. When he was a kid, his mother was mentally unhinged and attempted to kill him. She has been taken to a mental institution as a result and Will had moved on. That is, until he finds a box with some old family belongings. He finds a phone which contains voicemails from his mother.

The voicemails begin to get to Will. He starts to slack off at work. He begins to feel like something physically is wrong with him. He uses Google to self-diagnose, but the doctor tells him it is stress. Soon enough, Will slowly heads down a downward spiral where it begins to affect not only work, but his relationship with Luke? He begins to see himself with various physical defects, but are they real or are they part of his imagination?

The LGBTQ horror film is now becoming a major trend as of late. From Death Drop Gorgeous to Roger Conners’ Rebirth and the upcoming Meat, the meshing of LGBTQ themes and characters with the horror genre is set to become a new trendsetter for the world of terror. Addison Heimann, making his feature film directorial debut here, takes elements from his own life and takes us into a world of a man who after getting over the past has it come back to haunt him tenfold as he begins to experience something similar to his mother years ago.

Zach Villa pulls off an impressive performance as our protagonist Will, who we see as a child kind of stoic and dealing with his issues at home. However, once the adult Will comes in, we see him as happy and excited about both his job and his relationship with Luke, played with such support and natural chemistry by Devon Graye. Villa is the driving force of the film as we see both sides of the spectrum, from happy go lucky to someone who is about to lose his marbles and envisions himself with all sorts of cuts, bruises, and other lesions. It gets to a very dangerous level of insanity.

The supporting cast are excellent when it comes to their attempts to help get through to Will, even when it looks like there’s no hope. Madeline Zima, best known for her role on the long-running sitcom The Nanny, is great as Will’s boss and friend Blossom alongside American Carnage’s Yumarie Morales as co-worker. Paget Brewster is also great as one of the specialists who try to help Will while Marlene Forte is wickedly insane as the reason behind Will’s descent into madness, his mother.

Hypochondriac is a terrific character study that proves that LGBTQ and psychological horror can make quite a good team. Zach Villa’s stellar performance drives the film with some very effective visuals. This is quite a feature debut for Addison Heimann and should be checked out.

WFG RATING: A

XYZ Films presents a Minutehands Pictures production. Director: Addison Heimann. Producers: Bay Dariz and John Humber. Writer: Addison Heimann. Cinematography: Dustin Supencheck. Editing: Mike Hugo.

Cast: Zach Villa, Devon Graye, Madeline Zima, Yumarie Morales, Marlene Forte, Chris Doubek, Paget Brewster, Adam Busch, Peter Mensah, Debra Wilson.

The film will be released on Demand and Digital on July 29.