Cam is a 2018 Netflix Psychological Thriller film about a camgirl, Alice (Madeline Brewer) - although she goes by "Lola" on the Internet - who is on the brink of breaking into the top ten, when she learns she's been replaced by an identical stranger who steals her money, her rank, and possibly her life.
Examples of tropes include:
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Alice gets her identity stolen by a sentient computer virus.
- All Men Are Perverts: Except Alice's brother, Jordan. However, they are the kind of guys that would insinuate themselves into a cam girl's life, although there are also Jordan's friends.
- All Part of the Show: When Alice finally confronts her doppelganger over the public stream, the viewers in chat chalk it up to "special effects" or her having a twin sister she had get in on the act. Given that she did fake her own death as part of a stream earlier, her audience is apparently just used to her pulling weird stunts as part of the show.
- Casting Gag: Samantha Robinson, who played the titular character from The Love Witch (a Black Widow witch obsessed with male validation), plays Princess, a bitchy cam girl who has no boundaries with her clients.
- Cheerful A.I.: Fake-Lola is happy all the time and speaks in an eerie singsong. It's very creepy. Which is how Alice figures out to beat her, as the AI doesn't know how to simulate injury or misery, causing it to glitch out and winning the bet that allows her to retake her account.
- Confronting Your Imposter: Alice finally confronts the doppelganger in the movie's last act via video chat only to realize that "Lola" doesn't seem to be aware that they share the same face. This makes her realize the doppelganger is never conscious of what it actually looks like.
- Corrupting Pornography: Played with.
- Alice's dedication to her job as a cam girl is presented as a positive thing. However, the corruption happens when Alice is "picked up" and copied by a computer code that selects cam girls on the rise, stealing their money and doing a number on their sanity. This is not portrayed as a reflection on her, though.
- The men that Alice sees who watch her feeds are pathetic and unpleasant, from promising to save her and then masturbating to her digital doppelgänger to trying to elicit Sex for Services from her. However, possibly justified as they are not the only men who watch her, but the men who make an effort to infiltrate her real life
- Dead Person Impersonation: Alice realizes the doppelganger has taken over the identity of Hannah Darin, aka "Baby", despite the fact that she's been dead for six months.
- Delayed Family Acceptance: Alice is forced to reveal that she's a cam girl to her mother after they catch her brother's friends watching her videos. Her mom is furious, and it takes her a while to adjust to the idea (although it doesn't help that the neighbors graffitied her house). However, near the end of the movie, she comes to accept and even respect Alice's decision. She also does Alice's makeup and helps to disguise her identity when she returns to camming at the end.
- Everybody Lives: Apart from the revelation that Baby died six months ago, no one dies over the course of the movie.
- Fan Disservice: While Madeline Brewer wears a lot of revealing clothing and "Lola" is essentially the perfect Ms. Fanservice, there's several scenes involving the deliberate juxtaposition of the Fake Lola's sexuality with
how eerie it is for Alice to witness a doppelganger take over her identity near-perfectly. And that isn't even getting into the fake suicide scenes and the violent climatic "game" between Alice and the doppelgänger. - Innocent Fanservice Girl: Alice's camgirl persona is this, and she is mostly this as she is exceedingly normal and not very fanservicey in real life.
- The Internet Is for Porn: Justified by Alice's profession, but we never see her using the Internet except for it.
- It's Not Porn, It's Art: Discussed. Alice genuinely enjoys her profession for its own sake, but she dislikes it when people assume it's just sex or (even worse) easy.
- Karma Houdini: Brought up by Alice; the computer virus itself likely still exists after she deleted her Lola account, and if her service made it, it's likely they're just going to hijack another camgirl's identity. But, she knows what to look for, and can warn other camgirls of the early signs.
- Kiss Me, I'm Virtual: Invoked and played with. Alice's audience moves on to Fake-Lola, which leads to her meeting her viewers in real life. The main questions are whether her virtual self is preferable to her real self, and who can tell the difference.
- Nothing Is Scarier: It's explicitly said that Fake-Lola is a computer program, but nobody knows who programmed her, or even if she's just a product of the servers.
- Police Are Useless: Alice eventually calls the police for assistance in her identity theft case, but they turn down her case in that they are too skeptical to pursue it given even she can't explain what kind of thief it is. They're also very demeaning about her career.
- Predatory Prostitute:
- Discussed and subverted. Alice suspects Princess X of being involved in the takeover due to her bitchy dislike of Alice, but all the other women are furious with Alice and kick her out, and Alice figures out pretty fast that Princess might be a bitch, but she isn't involved at all.
- Also subverted by Fake Lola. It's scary to watch her cam with the guys while Alice watches, but despite what sounds to be some veiled threats and her very creepy voice, she is just a computer programme and therefore has no actual way to hurt Alice in real life.
- Preferable Impersonator: None of Alice's fans can actually tell the difference between her and Fake-Lola.
- Secret Sex Worker: Alice doesn't tell her brother or mother that she's a cam girl for fear that they'll judge her. This becomes a problem when Alice is replicated and her online and real lives start to collide, and one of her brother's friends finds videos of fake-Alice camming and gets punched for laughing about it. Her mother doesn't take it well, but her brother is much more understanding.
- Teens Are Monsters: Jordan's friends, specifically in regards to their condescending treatment of Alice and outing her as a cam girl at Jordan's birthday party. It's also possible that they were the ones who vandalized Alice's mom's house.
- Token Good Teammate: Jordan, Alice's brother, is the only man who isn't a disgusting pervert.
