Helmed by Ian Tuason, ‘Undertone’ lets the horrors of sound take center stage as it details the life of Evangeline “Evy” Babic, a podcaster who trades in paranormal events with a dose of skepticism. When her co-host presents her with a string of voice recordings that feel more voyeuristic than scary, Evy is naturally less impressed than usual. However, the more she listens and digs deep, the more she realizes that these tapes might contain something that cannot be put into words.
The fact that Evy is taking care of her dying mother all alone only makes things more complicated, as images of death, parenthood, childhood lullabies, and horrific events all come together to create an inescapable, auditory trap. By the end of this horror film, it becomes hard for both her and the audience to tell if the sounds are coming from inside her laptop or from the darkest corners of her house. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Undertone Plot Synopsis
‘Undertone’ begins with paranormal podcaster Evangeline “Evy” Babic living with her comatose mother at their family home, unsure of what to do with life. A doctor has projected that her mother only has a few days left to live, and Evy will know when it’s time based on the sounds of her mother’s breathing. Between taking care of her mother and trying to balance a toxic relationship with her boyfriend, Evy finds relief in life only when she sits down to record for her podcast, ‘The Undertone.’ The pattern is usually simple: her co-host, Justin Morales, brings in spooky stories that he wholeheartedly believes in, but she shrugs off. This time, Justin has a series of 10 audio recordings sent to him by an anonymous account, which seem to be a man’s attempt to record his pregnant wife talking in her sleep.
The first set of videos starts out as fairly ordinary, as the man, Mike, wakes up to find his wife, Jessa, mumbling the “London Bridge” rhymes. However, after looking into the song’s past and reversing its audio, he claims to hear “Mike, kill all.” While Evy doesn’t believe him, she is herself troubled when her favorite rhyme, “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep,” seemingly also produces darker meanings when reversed. The following recordings in the email take a turn for the more cryptic, as Jessa repeats the phrase “Uozyba-ni-emoc” in a growling voice. These are accompanied by strange phenomena, like the faucet opening on its own, or sounds of thuds taking over the apartment. Stranger still, Evy, still skeptical, begins experiencing the same phenomena at her own house, all the while her mother appears to remain motionless.
After a lot of brainstorming, Evy and Justin realize that Jessa is talking backward, and her phrase actually means “Come in Abyzou.” Evy then discovers that Abyzou is the name of a demonic spirit from ancient folklore, who is known to target pregnant women and cause miscarriages. To make things a lot more complicated, Evy learns that she is six weeks pregnant as well, despite being completely unprepared to become a mother. As she struggles to balance all of these ends of her life, the supernatural intrigue surrounding the voice recordings only increases. Evy learns that there are anecdotes of others who were cursed by Abyzou and took their children’s lives, but it is only after the tenth tape that things go out of control.
As the podcaster duo hears a recording of Mike seemingly killing his wife and unborn baby, a local listener identifies them as a real couple that lived close by, and died by murder suicide. Just then, Evy gets a phone call from yet another listener, named Abby, who claims that she’s about to kill her own child. Though Evy tries to stop her with an empathetic speech, Abby only responds with laughter as the call goes silent and the entire house begins to morph beyond recognition. With no place to hide, Evy decides to go upstairs to her mother, the one place she is still familiar with, or so she thinks.
Undertone Ending: Is Evy Killed by Her Mother? Did She Hallucinate it All?
As the ending of ‘Undertone’ cuts to black at its most cryptic moment, we have many possible interpretations for what might have unfolded between Evy, her mother, and a potential third, non-human party. The one thing that is for certain is that Evy’s mother has woken up in some capacity, and might even be hostile, but interestingly enough, we don’t hear any signs of Evy being attacked or killed in the final scene. There are no auditory cues that her mother is putting some physical effort into attacking her own daughter, and on the contrary, all we hear is a series of thuds that seem to be from someone toppling down. Evy also screams “Mama” immediately after that moment, and then continues doing so, almost to the point that it doesn’t feel like the sound of someone who’s fallen down an entire flight of stairs.
A more twisted, and yet more viable reading of the ending is that, while Evy’s mother has turned hostile, Evy survives the initial ambush and is met with a much crueler fate. Throughout the movie, it’s implied that the voice recordings may have the supernatural ability to pervade into Evy’s house and curse her to a fate much like the others she has looked into. And yet, in the last moment, this is revealed to be a misdirection, as it’s her mother who effectively becomes the vessel of this curse. This fits in with the appearance of that ominous figurine in Evy’s mother’s room, which might be one of the dolls or sculptures handed to her by a former victim of Abyzou, one who is mentioned briefly in Evy’s records.
It is possible that Evy’s mother has been active in the moments that Evy has her headphones on, which would explain the mysterious drawings on her wall, the blood-like stains on the kitchen table, and the many odd happenings that have taken hold of this house. However, another interpretation of all of these events lies in the theory that all of this is Evy’s psychosis-driven hallucination. It is strongly implied that she has had a drinking problem in the past, and the fact that we see her drink aggressively over the course of the movie is most certainly a clue. Adding to that, her uncertainty about becoming a mother, and also being holed up in the same house taking care of her mother, may have created a toxic psychological environment, one that warps her perspective on what might very well be her mother’s final moments.
Is Evy’s Mother Dead? What is the Sound at the End?
Though the entire final sequence is shrouded in darkness, the one sound that pulsates throughout is that of an odd click or rattle, most likely being made by Evy’s mother. Notably, it never rises or falls, or even shifts distances, unlike the screams and shuffles of Evy, which might be a clue as to exactly what is going on in this scene. Early on, a medical attendant tells Evy about a rattling sound that will begin during her mother’s final breaths, and it’s very possible that this is precisely the sound we are hearing throughout the ending. The question, then, falls back to the extent to which the final clash is real or imagined, as it might be that her mother is actually dying in her bed while Evy fails to process things, or it may be the sound of her mother dying after the fall from the stairs.
While it’s plausible that Evy’s mother meets her end after falling off the stairs and breathing her last, some of the flash sequences present an alternative scenario, where both Evy and her mother are choked to death by a plastic bag in what appears to be a murder suicide. Based on the sounds we hear at the end, that does not appear to be what is happening, which casts a doubt on anything we are led to believe about whatever’s happening at the staircase. Alternatively, it is possible that Evy’s lingering guilt of not praying for her mother, which she herself considers the same as “killing” her, may have manifested in a malicious way. Even without the element of demonic possession, the world we see right now might be how Evy is reacting to her mother’s death, at a time when she needs her more than ever.
One clue about the unreliable narration of this scene is the fact that Evy’s mother’s bed looks suspiciously well-made, almost as if no one’s been sleeping on it this entire time. While it’s possible that Evy’s mother has been dead this entire time, another explanation answers this with the supernatural, by positing that Evy’s mother woke up, made her own bed, and then went into the washroom. We have already seen her in standing upright reflections multiple times, and given that those sightings happen outside of Evy’s perspective, there might even be some truth to them. Evy’s mother once said in a voice recording that Evy will always be her little girl, which can be twisted as grounds for Abyzou to possess Evy’s mother instead, much like how it was not Jessa, but Mike, who seemingly got possessed into killing his own family. However, the death rattle effectively confirms that Evy’s mother is not making it out of that fateful night alive.
Is Abyzou Real? Who Was the Woman on Call?
While the demon known as Abyzou may be documented across various mythologies and legends, whether she’s the one behind the attacks on Evy and the others can be contested. To begin with, the scene where Evy’s house takes in elements from all the cases she’s investigated has both a psychological and a supernatural explanation. While it may be Abyzou’s spirit taking over the realm and coalescing all of her past successes, the more likely explanation is that Evy’s alcohol induced psychosis is magnifying and projecting all the weird and ghostly cases that she’s been obsessed with her entire life. However, the actual account of what happens that night is likely somewhere in the middle, and the final chants and overlayed voices all but confirm that Abyzou, whether she is real or a psychological construct, is now speaking through Evy.
Perhaps the most inexplicable evidence in this entire debate comes in the form of a phone call that is heard by both Evy and Justin. A woman named Abby, whose name sounds suspiciously close to Abyzou, claims that she is seconds away from drowning her own baby. It is possible that this scene is Abyzou quite literally testing the water, and it is precisely the moment she learns about Evy and her mother’s unusual dynamic that she decides on whom to target. The fact that Abby’s voice begins to distort just as she laughs at Evy’s fate is compelling enough, but still, that alone doesn’t prove that Abyzou is a real entity, and the same can be said about the mysterious email. While not physically enough, Abyzou’s real horror rests entirely in how she can seemingly take over minds, familiarizing people with the worst versions of themselves as they do her bidding and fuel the cycle.
What Happens to Justin?
The ending being entirely centered around Evy means that we barely get any input as to what is going on with Justin’s front. The last time we hear of him is when he admits that he cannot help Evy, and from then on, the audio files begin to distort on their own, repeating and rehashing older voice clips of Justin, leaving his fate in the dark. However, the fact that Abyzou is known to only target pregnant women raises the chances of Justin surviving the night, provided that his partner isn’t pregnant without him knowing. On the flip side, the fact that he never mentions any trouble on his end doesn’t necessarily mean that he is safe, as Evy only begins to express distress online when things get to the point of no return. Justin’s life might already be in Abyzou’s hands, but we will likely never know the whole truth.
The fact that the entire final sequence takes place in the dark also replicates Justin’s perspective in a way, as all he has to go by are Evy’s blood-curdling screams and the vague sounds of things falling or breaking. In that moment, Justin effectively becomes an extension of the audience, which is what makes the last scene of the movie more spooky. Evy, or some entity mimicking her voice, can be heard repeating Jessa’s lines to her husband, about things feeling cold and strange, before we are met with the reversed chant of “Uozyba-ni-emoc.” This can be interpreted as Evy or the entity’s attempts to spread the curse to whoever may be listening, and while in-universe that recipient is Justin, the movie ultimately leaves him with a fate as ambiguous as that of any other viewer, or rather, listener.
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