Fresh is a 2022 American horror thriller film directed by Mimi Cave, in her directorial debut, from a screenplay by Lauryn Kahn. The film stars Daisy Edgar-Jones and Sebastian Stan. It is a co-production between Legendary Pictures and Hyperobject Industries; Adam McKay produced the film alongside Kevin J. Messick.
Fresh had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 20, 2022, and was released on March 4, 2022, via Hulu by Searchlight Pictures in the United States and Disney+ via Star internationally, marking the first Legendary film released by Disney rather than Warner Bros. Pictures, Universal Pictures or Netflix. The film received generally positive reviews from critics.
Plot[]
Noa, a woman from Portland, is increasingly disillusioned with online dating and the rude men she interacts with. One day at the supermarket, a man named Steve flirts with her and they exchange numbers. On their first date, the two quickly hit it off and have sex. After several dates, Steve invites Noa for a weekend break away alone with him. Against the advice of her best friend Mollie, Noa agrees to the trip. Planning to travel early the following day, Noa spends the evening at Steve's luxury home. Steve drugs Noa's cocktail and she falls unconscious.
Noa wakes up in captivity, chained to the ground. Steve explains that he is a butcher of human meat, which he both consumes himself and sells to wealthy clients. They prefer the meat of young women, so he regularly lures and abducts women on dates. He says that he will keep Noa alive as long as possible in order to keep her meat fresh as he intends to surgically remove different pieces of her body over time. Steve allows Noa to take a shower, but she tries to escape. Steve captures her and harvests her buttocks as punishment. Noa speaks to a woman named Penny who is being held captive in an adjacent room, and Penny tells her that a woman who's singing incoherently is another victim named Melissa who has gone insane.
Meanwhile, Mollie becomes concerned about Noa's disappearance and begins investigating with her friend Paul, a bartender who served Noa and Steve drinks on their first date. After searching online, Mollie discovers Steve is actually named Brendan, and is married to a woman named Ann with whom he has children. Mollie visits Ann and informs her of Brendan’s apparent affair. Brendan arrives, but denies any knowledge of Noa when questioned by Mollie. As she leaves, Mollie calls Noa's phone, which begins ringing in Brendan's pocket. Ann, revealed to be Brendan's accomplice, knocks Mollie unconscious. It is revealed that Ann has a prosthetic leg and was one of Brendan's victims before he fell for her.
Noa gains Brendan's trust by flirting and pretending to be interested in what human meat tastes like. Brendan invites her to dinner and persuades her to taste a lavish meal containing human meat, which Noa pretends to appreciate; she later vomits in her cell. Meanwhile, Brendan takes Mollie away for harvesting. Brendan invites Noa to another dinner, providing her with a pink dress as a gift. Before dinner, Brendan shows Noa a hidden compartment filled with items belonging to his victims, indicating he has abducted and murdered dozens of women before her. Noa recognizes Mollie's phone among the stolen victims' phones in one of the compartments. He feeds Noa breast meat, which Brendan connotes as possibly tasting "familiar." Following dinner, Noa persuades Brendan to have sex with her and let her perform fellatio on him; she instead bites off his testicles. With Brendan injured, but in pursuit, Noa helps Mollie and Penny escape from their rooms. The three encounter Brendan in the kitchen and fight him, then escape into the woods with Brendan pursuing them with a gun.
In the meantime, before she was abducted, Mollie had shared her location via phone with Paul. When he does not hear back from Mollie, Paul follows the location and arrives at Brendan's house. However, hearing gunshots fired by Brendan, Paul turns away fearing for his life.
In the woods, Noa, Mollie, and Penny manage to attack him again, with Noa taking the gun and shooting Brendan dead. Ann arrives at the house and finds Brendan's body. She encounters Noa in the woods and tries to strangle her, but Noa stabs Ann in the neck with car keys. As Ann recovers and attempts to strangle Noa again, Mollie bludgeons Ann with a shovel. As she and Mollie relax at last, Noa receives a text from a man she went out with at the beginning of the film.
A mid-credits scene depicts five of Brendan's clients in a white room, seated at a table with bleeding human meat at the center. A Satanic symbol is displayed during the end credits, indicating that Brendan and his clients are part of a Satanist organization.
Cast[]
- Daisy Edgar-Jones as Noa
- Sebastian Stan as Steve/Brendan
- Jonica T. Gibbs as Mollie
- Charlotte Le Bon as Ann
- Andrea Bang as Penny
- Dayo Okeniyi as Paul
- Brett Dier as Chad