When horror and home surveillance collide. Directed by Ehrland Hollingsworth, the psychological horror thriller Dooba Dooba uses in-home security footage to turn the familiar into the terrifying.
The film stars Amna Vegha as Amna, a babysitter who assumes she’s landed a routine gig, only to discover that the teenage girl she’s supposed to watch, harbors deep emotional scars and a disturbing set of behaviors that escalate into nightmarish territory.
Along with Amna Vegha (Haven, How to Successfully Fail in Hollywood), also starring in the film are Betsy Sligh (Found, Homestead), Winston Haynes (The Advocate, Judas and the Black Messiah), Erin O’Meara, and Billy Hulsey.
Dooba Dooba first made its rounds on the horror festival circuit in 2025, winning Best Overall Feature at Nightmares Film Festival and Best Horror Film at Midwest WeirdFest, with additional honors from Panic Fest, Unnamed Footage Festival, Another Hole in the Head, and Central Florida Film Festival.
It is slated to be released in US theaters on January 23, 2026, courtesy of Dark Sky Films.
In the film, 16-year-old Monroe still needs a babysitter nearly a decade after her brother’s murder. Amna comes to babysit Monroe and learns that not only is she being watched by security cameras, but she needs to say ‘dooba dooba’ whenever she moves throughout the house, to let Monroe know that it’s her. The night goes on, and Amna becomes increasingly unnerved and Monroe increasingly attached.
In a comprehensive interview about the film’s creative process, director Ehrland Hollingsworth explained how he wanted to harness the unsettling aesthetics of security cameras and analog horror to generate fear that feels both intimate and voyeuristic. He told Mulderville “The original sort of spark… well, I wanted to do something from security cameras, and security cameras have this very eerie angle, and I think the feeling just sort of, like, right off the bat, this kind of, like, high-angle stuff. And that was sort of like, can you translate that feeling into a feature film and then sort of overlay on top of that the aesthetics of YouTube analog horror, which I think is very effective at this particular sense of dread? And so those were kind of the two things as far as the tone I was trying to achieve.”
Early reviews from critics and festival screenings have been strong, particularly for the film’s unsettling mood and inventive use of found footage. On Rotten Tomatoes, Dooba Dooba has earned praise from critics who call it “a devilishly funny, awkward, and downright ghoulish lo-fi horror gem” that “sinks into the audience’s psyche.”
Watch the official teaser trailer for Dooba Dooba above.
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