Over the past few years, Samara Weaving and Kyle Gallner have been making a name for themselves in the horror and thriller space, with the former spawning the Ready or Not franchise and starring in Borderline (2025) and the latter taking on Smile (2022) and Strange Darling (2024). Both have even appeared in Scream films, albeit in different entries. The pair come together in 2026 in Adam Carter Rehmeier’s Carolina Caroline, a genre-blending romance following Caroline (Weaving) as she becomes infatuated with con-man Oliver (Gallner). They set out to travel the southeast as he teaches her the ways of confidence schemes and low-level crime as a means of getting by.
With a script from William Thomas Dean IV, Carolina Caroline combines some of the best aspects of the crime thriller, romance, and road trip film all into one. It all begins with Caroline seeing Oliver pull off a short-change scam at the gas station she works at. As the former face of the franchise gas station employee, I am well acquainted with this scam and have told people to get out of my store for even attempting to fool me on it. Nevertheless, Oliver pulls it off successfully on the store owner, and Caroline chases him out to confront him. Her anger quickly turns to interest as they chat, and we’re off to the races.
The plot beats here aren’t anything you haven’t seen before, but it’s Weaving and Gallner’s chemistry that make the movie great. Like Caroline, the audience gets swept up in the excitement Oliver brings to the table. It’s simultaneously romantic and tragic. It’s all fun, games, and passion for Caroline until Oliver takes things a step too far. The illusion is gone, the shine has worn off. Then he’ll do something charming and sweep her off her feet yet again.
Taking place in the 90s, Carolina Caroline pays homage to 70s road trip films with sunburnt images and the true anonymity you could have traveling through small Southern towns before cell phones and a sprawling internet. If you don’t make too much noise, you can move through these dusty towns with no one remembering you were ever there. At the start of their journey, Caroline and Oliver make just enough money to cover getting to the next town and a few nights at a motel. They’re merely surviving, not necessarily building towards some grander plan outside of making it to South Carolina. In almost every town they stop in, they stick out simply from not being a resident there. Everyone knows everyone. But come up with a story of why you’re there and no one will think twice. This is how the pair grift their way across the south.
Rehmeier’s direction is certainly a high point of the film, especially when you view it in light of his last film Snack Shack (2024). While the plots of these films are wildly different, Rehmier understands both the intricacies and energies of small-town America and what it feels like to be swept up in something out of your control as a young person. Snack Shack is firmly in the coming-of-age category due to the age of its characters, but Caroline is also coming-of-age in her own respect in this film. Some of the most intoxicating sequences of the decade come from these two Rehmeier films. He has an outstanding ability to build and sustain energy that far exceeds that of many of his peers. Carolina Caroline is undoubtedly a more mature film, but the parallels are impossible to ignore.
Carolina Caroline showcases Samara Weaving and Kyle Gallner as major talents outside of the horror realm, and further solidifies Adam Carter Rehmeier as a director with impressive skill and vision. This movie is so, so fun and I hope it finds its audience as it continues to spread to theaters around the country and make its way to streaming later this year.
Carolina Caroline showcases Samara Weaving and Kyle Gallner as major talents outside of the horror realm, and further solidifies Adam Carter Rehmeier as a director with impressive skill and vision.
Proud owner of three movie passes. Met Harrison Ford at a local diner once. Based in Raleigh, NC.
