- Sensibility: The film gets away with a lot abusing the demonic/spiritual characteristics of the story, but even then lots of this film is hard to swallow.
- Cinematography: The highlight of this film is its imagery choices. Great production design, locations, lighting, and particularly interesting framing choices make even the most
cliche jump-scares interesting and visually appealing. Editing is solid, but the CGI and tech imagery is a bit lackluster.
- Energy: Gripping, scary, classic horror film with a snappy run-time. Hits a few bumps in the road mostly due to predictability and lacking food-for-thought. The ending also has a pretty big shift in tone which
disrupts the flow and leaves a bad taste as the credits roll.
- Narrative: The films biggest weakness is a lack of strong writing outside of the core idea. The main characters are too simple, bland, and uninventive and the film abuses a wild old-timer
trope and jump-scare setups that are far too common to the horror genre. The religious elements of the film are painfully cliche. The ending of the film is so derivative that I actually experienced deja vu with the dialogue and imagery.
- T-Points: The film received two bonus points: one for a great bit of rotating shot-making in a parking lot, one for a great scene with excellent visuals around a projection of Roman Holiday, and one for a great scene with a
tail light as the only light source.
In a year with so many good horror films, this one falls a bit flat. It has a few good ideas visually but is really just a run-of-the-mill horror-thriller.
Number of Watches: 1
