Director: Michael Tyburski
Imagine a society that solved heartbreak, anger and grief with a single daily pill, then imagine what happens the first time a couple decides to skip it. That is the premise Turn Me On builds its story around.
What is Turn Me On about?
The film takes place in a near-future where a government-mandated vitamin suppresses emotion as a matter of routine public policy, keeping citizens calm, productive and largely unbothered by feeling much of anything. A young couple, curious about what they are missing, quietly stops taking their dose. What follows is not a dramatic uprising but a slow, disorienting rediscovery: love arrives first as confusion, then as something closer to joy, and physical intimacy returns alongside a flood of feelings neither of them has experience managing. The film treats emotion itself as the plot's real subject, following the pair as they realize that wanting connection also means absorbing jealousy, fear and disappointment they had never had to face before. Director Michael Tyburski keeps the science-fiction premise understated, using it as a lens on modern emotional numbness rather than as a backdrop for spectacle.
Cast & crew
Bel Powley and Nick Robinson play the central couple rediscovering feeling for the first time, with Justin H. Min, D'Arcy Carden, Nesta Cooper, Griffin Newman, Luke Kirby and Patti Harrison filling out the supporting cast. The film is directed by Michael Tyburski, whose earlier work has similarly used quiet science-fiction premises to examine ordinary emotional life.
Context & significance
Turn Me On, released in 2024 and running 99 minutes, sits in a small but distinct tradition of speculative fiction that imagines emotional suppression as public health policy rather than as an obvious dystopian evil. Rather than staging a rebellion against the system, the film stays close to one couple's private experience of what they gain and lose by opting out. Its blend of science fiction, romance and drama keeps the tone closer to an intimate character study than a genre thriller, using the vitamin premise mainly to sharpen questions about intimacy, vulnerability and what people actually want from connection.
Where & how to watch
Turn Me On is available to stream on K-Time after logging in with a free account; browsing this page and its FAQs requires no account at all. K-Time's platform is designed for the Iranian diaspora, offering a Farsi-language interface and search alongside the film's original English-language version.