Lifechanger is a 2018 low-budget indie horror film written and directed by Justin McConnell.
Main character Drew is a relatively unassuming guy who just wants to start a relationship with Julia, the girl of his dreams... but as it turns out, Drew is a shapeshifter, and has been killing hundreds of people over the years in order to assume their identities and preserve his own life.
With his health beginning to falter and increased police attention surrounding the disappearances he leaves in his wake, he's anxious to consummate his love for Julia in a body she'll accept...
This film features examples of:
- Accidental Murder:
- Drew first discovered his shapeshifting powers when he unintentionally used them on his mother, killing her just like all his other victims.
- Drew honestly didn't mean to kill Julia, but after she found out that he was a murderer and delivered a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown in an attempt to stop him, he ended up accidentally using his powers on instinct.
- Bittersweet Ending: Drew's quest to find love fails when he accidentally shapeshifts into Julia over the course of a struggle, killing her. Consumed with despair, he decides to remain in Julia's form until he decomposes to death... only to become a chrysalis, which eventually opens to reveal Drew in his natural, elderly form, giving him a new - if bittersweet - lease on life.
- Burn Baby Burn: After taking Emily's form, killing her boyfriend, and assuming the identity of the cop who came to investigate, Drew opts to just burn Emily's house to the ground rather than waste time disposing of the corpses in his usual manner.
- Collector of Forms: Drew can't change on his own and needs to absorb the essence of his victim by touch before he can do so - at the cost of reducing the target to a desiccated husk.
- Disposing of a Body: Because the corpses of his victims can still be identified, Drew has to dispose of them immediately after he takes a new form. His most common option is to bury them under the floorboards of a barn in the countryside... and he's been using this option for years. In the finale, Drew is seen leaving the property, prompting the owner to have the barn investigated by the police and resulting in the identities of every single one of Drew's victims being televised - which naturally makes Julia suspicious as Drew spoke to her as several of them.
- Driven to Suicide: In the finale, after Drew accidentally kills Julia, he decides to remain in her form until he rots away once and for all. However, it doesn't quite work out that way...
- Fake Identity Baggage: Early in the film, Drew is in the form of Emily when he bumps into her boyfriend... and because he's still new to her identity, he doesn't know anything about her or the boyfriend. Consequently, Drew's forced to cover his tracks by killing the boyfriend.
- Fan Disservice: Drew's victims often appear naked, thanks to having their clothes stolen... and all of them are left as dried-out husks by the shapeshifting process.
- Follow That Car: At one point, Drew gets in a cab and asks the driver to follow the Julia, hoping to figure out her address. The cabbie, also a woman, rightly assumes him to be a stalker and refuses his demand, calling it creepy.
- Intoxicated Superpower Snag: Exploited. Use of drugs like cocaine accelerates the shapeshifting decomposition, but as Drew's ability to assume a new form works best when he's close to decomposing, he needs to keep some around just in case he needs to change in a hurry.
- Karma Houdini: After finally emerging in his true form, Drew can't be connected to any of the crimes he's committed, ending the film scot-free.
- Kill and Replace: Drew's shapeshifting gift kills whoever he copies. As such, he has to dispose of the body so that nobody will notice the identity theft, then learn the new identity as best as he can.
- Modesty Bedsheet: Subverted; when Drew wakes up in Emily's form at the start of the film, her breasts are quite openly exposed. Drew awkwardly pulls the sheet up to his shoulders.
- The Murder After: The film begins with Drew waking up in bed, right next to his latest victim's desiccated corpse - and wearing her form, for good measure. In a dose of Black Comedy, Drew's expression can only be described as "What Did I Do Last Night??"
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: When Julia finds out that Drew is a killer, she goes to justifiably extreme measures to get him away from her, tasing him to the ground, before climbing on top of him and punching the shit out of him. Unfortunately, Drew then instinctively uses his powers - killing Julia.
- Power Degeneration: The longer Drew remains in a single form, the more he decomposes. He can hold the process at bay with powerful antibiotics, but this can only work for so long before he has to pick a new form... or risk dying.
- Shapeshifter Longevity: Drew was born in the 1940s and began shapeshifting in early adolescence, showing no sign of true aging in any of the forms he has adopted since then; in his case, his longevity is explicitly tied in with his ability to transform, for the longer he remains in a single shape, the more his body decomposes — a process he can only keep at bay for a few months per body with heavy-duty antibiotics.
- Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Drew's clothes don't change when he does, often forcing him to strip his victims naked post-mortem. Most notable in the finale, when Drew accidentally becomes Julia and is left in Robert's now-oversized clothes.
- Stalker with a Crush: Drew has been following Julia for years on end and will do anything to be with her - including multiple murders. Consequently, he will attempt to speak to her in almost every single form he assumes over the course of the film; it's not until the climax that he finally finds his golden ticket - Robert, a man who was apparently dating Julia.
- Traumatic Superpower Awakening: Drew first discovered his powers when he accidentally used them on his own mother, and he's been running ever since.
- Villain Protagonist: Drew isn't without conscience, but he's still a serial killer in all but name. Even Julia isn't spared death at his hands.
