Dark Match
Written and directed by Lowell Dean
Starring Ayisha Issa, Steven Ogg, Michael Eklund, Sara Canning, Chris Jericho, Jonathan Cherry
Unrated
Runtime: 1 hour and 34 minutes
Streaming exclusively on Shudder January 31

by Allie Lembo, Staff Writer

“I defy anyone watching to call what we do fake. Not tonight.”

For pro wrestling and horror fans, there’s a love of the artifice. It’s not about how ‘real’ something is; it’s about the dedication to that thing. Along comes Shudder’s Dark Match, a horror film about pro wrestlers that likes to toy around with if the threat they’re facing is real or just a front. In this 94-minute bloodbath written and directed by Lowell Dean (dir. Wolfcop, 2014), a small-time wrestling company in 1988 is invited to fight in a dark match, an unrecorded match, on a rural compound for more money than they’re used to. Met with a quasi-religious cult, they begin to discover their themed matches may have a greater importance to the cult than just entertainment.

Nik a.k.a. Miss Behave (Ayisha Issa) is the star, despite a good chunk of the main action being sourced out to her situationship, Joe a.k.a. “Mean” Joe Lean (Steven Ogg). Brandishing chains as her go-to prop and often playing the heel–the bad guy–she’s a badass in the ring. Outside the ring, as the only Black woman in her wrestling company and the entire film, she’s more guarded; it’s that skepticism shaped by her life experiences that makes her a worthy protagonist to root for. As the first to spot trouble at every turn, she makes no “stupid main character” decisions.

Once the five themed matches at the compound begin, the cult premise of the film starts to make good on its promise as the matches turn deadly. From there, it’s a joy to watch the combination of pro wrestling’s good ol’ rehearsed choreo and the ruthless blows to the death. Many of the actors are played by real pro wrestlers, a move that maybe hampers some of the emotional moments but pays off with every punch, slam, or shot of glistening muscle. The cinematography has a real pro wrestling sensibility, highlighting every move and building tension with every impact.

As for the 1988 of it all, there are some great details and some concessions. It’s always a treat to see that ubiquitous 1970’s orange and brown zig-zag patterned crochet blanket make an appearance, but the costumes are a bit vague. There are super fun needle drops from KISS and Striker, but actor Chris Jericho’s band’s 2004 metal song makes a cheeky addition. However, the yearning for the ‘80s is there. The film opens with an introduction to the Stars of Amateur Wrestling, intercut with grainy neon-drenched video of their matches, akin to what you’d see on a CRT television in 1988. It’s part of a growing trend of movies capitalizing on the nostalgia of watching media in the 20th century: I Saw The TV Glow (dir. Jane Schoenbrun, 2024), Censor (dir. Prano Bailey-Bond, 2021), and Skinamarink (dir. Kyle Edward Ball, 2022). Dark Match combines the nostalgia for watching vintage horror with the nostalgia for watching pro wrestling making an absolute must-see film for fans of both.

The opening scene is a smart move to foreshadow a later reveal; cult leader, former pro wrestler The Prophet (Jericho), is not just hyping up the crowd but also what the wrestlers discover to be the cameras, meaning it’s not a dark match at all. Nik laments how they’ll sell the footage for a fortune. It’s hard to imagine media, even fetish and snuff content, inaccessible to the point of immense value these days, but there are audiences still paying for what they like instead of endlessly scrolling streaming: horror and wrestling fans.

For all the digs at pro wrestling being fake, my friends who watch it weekly and go to matches proudly declare their love for the fakeness of it all. When a character in Dark Match is asked how he faked his own death, he chokes out “kayfabe”–the professional wrestling term for staging scripted events as true–which is met with awe. For all its toying, Dark Match can’t help but reveal the truth in a gimmick at the end, like a true pro wrestler’s final act of showmanship. Besides some drawn out scenes, this is a fun, fight-packed film that’s bound to develop its own cult following in the overlap of the horror and pro wrestling communities.

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