A teenage girl sits in her room. She looks around – at her room, a dollhouse, her phone. Then, a YouTuber named Patricia Coma appears. The rooms shift. Now, the girl is the one being watched. We enter the girl's dreams, her imagination, and her video calls. Suddenly, we're back in the room again.

A surprise project made just before production began on his feature film The Beast (2023), Bertrand Bonello describes Coma as the final installment in his trilogy on youth, following Nocturama (2016) and Zombi Child (2019). The restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic sparked a compelling kind of creative filmmaking. Coma was shot in Bonello’s own home, with a score composed by himself. The film went on to win the FIPRESCI Award for Best Film at the Berlin International Film Festival.

“The essayist wears proudly the confusion of an independent soul trying to grope in isolation toward the truth,” wrote film critic Phillip Lopate. That is precisely what allows Bonello to create a deeply personal reality – one in which many can recognize themselves. The film delves into the surreal world of the pandemic. Our aimless lockdown obsessions are paraded: serial killers, diets, games. What’s left after this merciless dissection? Our fears: violence against women, abandonment, our subconscious. That’s when the real horror begins.