I love a good modern psychological mystery wrapped in noir. Gazer, the feature debut of Ryan J. Sloan, is exactly that: moody, unsettling, and disorienting in the best way. Co-written by lead actress Ariella Mastroianni, the film pulls us into the fractured world of Frankie Rhodes (Mastroianni), a young mother battling dyschronometria, a rare neurological condition that distorts her sense of time. To keep herself grounded, she records her memories on cassette tapes, but even those aren’t always enough.

Frankie is barely holding her life together. Financial stress weighs on her, her condition isolates her, and worst of all, her connection with her daughter is slipping away. Then, she sees something; an altercation, maybe something worse, through an upper-floor apartment window. And the woman walking out of that building (Renee Gagner)? She looks familiar, too familiar. When Frankie later meets her at a suicide survivors’ support group, there’s an eerie sense of déjà vu.

Frankie has her own history with loss. Her late husband, Roger, lingers in her mind like a missing puzzle piece. What really happened that night? She doesn’t fully know, and her condition won’t let her. And that uncertainty is enough to put her dangerously close to suspicion.

Struggling to make ends meet, Frankie takes a job from this mysterious woman, who promises easy money. A chance to secure something, anything, for her daughter before it’s too late. But with that decision, she’s pulled into a psychological nightmare of mistaken identity, paranoia, and true-crime horror.

The film’s atmosphere is stunning: dark, gritty, and hypnotic. The cinematography keeps us locked in Frankie’s world, thick with uncertainty. Then, just as we start to settle into its noir style, Gazer shifts, surreal, Cronenbergian body horror slips in, twisting reality until it feels like we’re losing time right alongside Frankie. These Jacob’s Ladder-esque moments work to show her mental unraveling, though at times, they risk pulling the film too far from its noir foundation.

But what keeps Gazer strong is its pacing and dialogue, natural, unforced. From the moment we meet Frankie, we’re right there with her, feeling every moment of fear, confusion, and desperation. For a debut, Sloan swings big, and with Mastroianni co-writing, the story finds a real emotional core. And speaking of Mastroianni, she’s phenomenal. Frankie’s grief, her longing, her slow unraveling, it all feels raw, lived-in, heartbreakingly real.

Gazer doesn’t hand you easy answers. It leaves you adrift, just like Frankie. And that’s exactly what makes it work.