Oculus (2013): A Review

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This supernatural horror film stars Karen Gillan, Brenton Thwaites, Rory Cochrane and Katee Sackhoff, and tells of an antique mirror that is home to a malevolent entity responsible for the possession and horrific mutilation and deaths of those who have owned it throughout the centuries.  And it was a bigger disappointment than I anticipated.

More than a mere supernatural horror film, Oculus is also a psychological thriller in some respects.  It follows the lives, past and present simultaneously, of the two main characters, Tim and Kaylie.  If you don’t mind going rapidly back and forth in the timeline, then you’ll not see such an approach as a problem in this film.  If it’s done correctly, I don’t mind this form of storytelling, but I was extremely disappointed in director Mike Flanagan’s style.  The fluctuations from past to present and vice versa were much too frequent and, though they personally didn’t cause me any confusion, they certainly got old very quickly.  This was a significant blow to the entire movie as a whole — build-up is an important aspect of suspense and horror, and this movie felt a bit rushed.  You’ll not really be confused until the end where, of course, there is a twist, but it makes zero sense.  Afterwards, during your mental recap, everything else that happened prior to the last fifteen minutes or so will be moot, as you’ll be exerting every last brain cell in an attempt to make sense of the final scene.  And you can’t, my friend, don’t even try.

Don’t get me wrong, it was creepy.  I wouldn’t necessarily call it scary, however.  To me, there’s a difference between the two adjectives.

Oculus really isn’t anything new — it’s basically a patchwork quilt of things a majority of us have already seen before, appearing to draw influence from films such as Mirrors, The Messengers and maybe a little from Insidious.  What makes it creepy (not scary) is the psychological factor: it plays on one’s fear of unwillingly intermingling reality with fantasy.  The entity itself would certainly put someone in therapy for life were it to manifest in the real world, but let’s be honest — compared to the horrific, cracking corpse in The Grudge, this mirror-dwelling spirit is child’s play.  It’s the eyes, man.  The eyes.  And that’s about it.

In fact, even more disturbing is the fact that the official trailer for the film displayed more gore than was actually present in the entire movie, so if you’re looking for a bloodbath, this isn’t the movie for you.  Ever present, on the other hand, is the growing sense of dread.  The music extorts that feeling, but there’s no sense of “I’m covering my eyes now because I can’t bear to see what happens next.”

Horror?  Eh… not quite.  Maybe for the horror-flick amateur, but not for the seasoned vets.  About all I can really say is the parts were well-played.  And it was good the first time around, but it definitely is not worth a second glance afterward.  I tried to watch it again about an hour later and I got bored about twenty minutes in.

All in all, I rate it a 3.  I can see there was some effort put into its making and, with some tweaking, it had the potential to be an original horror film, but it doesn’t quite make the cut.