Movie Review: JITTERS

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: March 24th, 2026 / 09:54 PM

JITTERS movie poster | ©2026 Reel 2 Reel Films

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Daniel Jordan, Fabrizio Santino, Anto Sharp, Jessica Impiazzi, Chloe Hews, Boo Miller, Lauren Budd, Guillaume Rivaud, Linda-Jean Barry
Writer: George Wilcox
Director: Marc Zammit
Distributor: Reel 2 Reel Films
Release Date: March 17, 2026 (digital, U.S. and U.K.)

Written by George Wilcox and directed by Mark Zammit, JITTERS seeks to combine a NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET type of horror with sci-fi (at least for now) tech, criminal procedural and human pathos. That’s a lot to juggle, and the movie isn’t always up to the tasks the filmmakers set for themselves.

JITTERS revolves around a concept that, unfortunately for it, is more real-world scary than movie-scary. It involves immersive AI in a specific way that has distinctly ominous possibilities but is dramatized here in a way that puts too much on its VR title character, Jitters (Daniel Jordan).

The film opens with a woman we’ll learn is game developer Tiffany (Jessica Impiazzi), running in terror through red-lit subway tunnels, flashlight in hand. Jitters’s rhyming voice pursues her, and she yells for him to shut up. A conventional (as opposed to a subway hatch) doorway appears on the tracks, but the door closes before Tiffany can reach it.

We cut to Taylor (Boo Miller) as she arrives home and finds Tiffany dead in a chair, wearing a VR headset.

The case falls to police detective Nick Collymore (Fabrizio Santino), back on the job “in a limited capacity” after an incident. Nick is separated from his wife Julia (Lauren Budd), with whom he shares custody of beloved young daughter Izzy (Chloe Hews).

Nick’s investigation eventually brings him to Jitters, who taunts his victims with riddles about themselves. If they can admit their deepest fears and solve the puzzle, they survive, but most would rather figuratively and literally run away, sealing their doom.

JITTERS toggles back and forth between the virtual world, Nick’s family issues and police procedural. Nick’s best friend and colleague, Detective Sam Harding (Anto Sharp), who is looking into the livestreamed suicide of another game developer.

Oddly, the family aspect is the most compelling, with Santino, Budd and Hews all creating persuasive warmth and concern.

The cop aspect doesn’t work as well. We can’t figure out why Sam is so resistant to Nick’s belief that the weird deaths of two people in the same industry in the same city might be linked. There are also inconsistencies, starting with Nick’s account of Taylor’s statement about finding Tiffany’s body. There’s no reason for either of them to lie, so it looks like a continuity error.

We can just about accept that Nick is an American who has somehow become a U.K. police detective, even though we never get an explanation. However, when we meet a major character with the Anglo name of Ben Casey (Guillaume Rivaud), who sounds as French as Gerard Depardieu, and this goes unmarked as well, we can’t help but think attention to detail here is a bit lacking.

Finally, there’s Jitters and what he represents. He manifests as a malevolent clown, but he’s never as personally menacing as he ought to be. While we understand from a meta standpoint why the filmmakers wanted Jitters to be represented by a single actor/character, it also doesn’t track that he appears to all of his victims as the same avatar.

And then there’s the paradox of Jitters. As an AI product, he claims to have soulless, empty eyes, but he doesn’t – his gaze is full of bright malice. It’s hard to know what we’re meant to make of this.

There are some individually strong moments. Linda-Jean Barry as a doctor gives a surprisingly compelling exposition speech and Hews is often affecting.

When it comes to the psychological acuity of people dying rather than being honest with themselves, JITTERS is intriguing. It just tries to deal with too many additional matters.

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