Self Driver
Hello everyone and welcome to my blog. For those who know me you know about my love for horror films so once a month, I’m going to review and discuss a scary flick. We’ll look at the classics, and some new films, and I want your suggestions on what I should review. I’ll do my best to cover all the different genres within the genre – slashers, ghosts, monsters, etc.
SPOILER ALERT! – These will be reviews so if you haven’t seen the movie you’ll want to watch it first before you read this. Let’s do this.
SELF DRIVER
While I typically stick to horror films, Self Driver caught my attention with its intriguing trailer, and I'm glad I gave this Canadian short thriller a chance.
Self Driver is an hour-and-a-half character study that follows D, a struggling rideshare driver working for a company called VRMR. Like so many people in today's gig economy, he's just trying to make ends meet, grinding through monotonous rides while dealing with demanding passengers and an unforgiving system. The film captures that frustrating reality perfectly—you know, like those old Taxi Cab Confessions episodes on HBO, where drivers became invisible witnesses to strangers' stories, shot after shot of someone stuck behind the wheel.
D's got a family to support—a wife and kid—and he's desperate for one big score to help them through the weekend. That's when fate intervenes in the form of a mysterious passenger who claims to be an entrepreneur with a new rideshare startup. This guy promises D can make thousands per night, but there's a catch: once you install the app and start taking jobs, you can't say no. Refuse a ride, and you lose everything you've earned.
What follows is a descent into an increasingly surreal night as D follows the app's bizarre directions. These aren't normal GPS instructions—just cryptic commands like "turn here" or "go this way" that lead him down unfamiliar paths. The passengers get stranger too: a woman in angel wings snorting cocaine, a man he's explicitly told not to talk to, and others who seem to be part of some larger, sinister game.
The film's most unsettling moment comes when the app instructs D to park and start punching a passenger. Without spoiling everything, let's just say the evening takes some wild turns that push the boundaries of how far someone will go when they're desperate enough.
What makes Self Driver particularly effective is how it taps into the anxiety of modern gig work. There's a brilliant scene where D tries to call VRMR’s customer service, fighting through automated menus and screaming "Talk to a representative!" into his phone. Anyone who's ever dealt with automated phone systems will feel that frustration in their bones. It's these authentic touches that ground the film's more fantastical elements in recognizable reality.
Director and producer Michael Piero has crafted something that feels both timely and timeless. In our world of Uber, Lyft, and constant connectivity, we've all become participants in this anonymous economy where strangers climb into cars with other strangers multiple times a day. The film asks uncomfortable questions about the power dynamics at play and what happens when desperation meets opportunity.
From a production standpoint, Self Driver is impressively simple. Shot entirely in and around the car in the great white north of Toronto using what appear to be small Sony vlogging cameras, the film embraces its guerrilla-style approach. Piero and his team apparently filmed in locations where they weren't necessarily supposed to be, giving the whole thing an authentic, handheld energy that serves the story perfectly. This isn't Hollywood polish, and that's exactly why it works. The lo-fi aesthetic matches the gritty subject matter, proving that compelling cinema doesn't require massive budgets—just good storytelling and creative problem-solving.
Nathaniel Chadwick delivers a solid performance as D, carrying most of the film's emotional weight as a man caught between desperation and dignity. The supporting cast, including Reese Presley and Lauren Welner, effectively populate this strange nocturnal world where nothing is quite what it seems.
Self Driver succeeds because it finds horror in the mundane and pushes familiar anxieties to their logical extreme. It's a film that will make you think twice the next time you summon a ride or wonder about the person behind the wheel. In our increasingly disconnected digital economy, we're all just passengers in someone else's story—and sometimes, those stories take darker turns than we expect.
Self Driver was released through Xenophobia in May and you can see it on Apple TV and Amazon Prime in early June. At 90 minutes, it's a tight, effective thriller that lingers long after the ride ends. Thanks once again to my friend Scott Motisko for bringing me another gem to screen.
Enjoy the trailer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onw4dqr-O_A