![]() They're still appealing, as many seem driven by loneliness, but if the few connections that are made on-screen could have been emotionally elevated a little bit, their impact could have been much stronger. ![]() But the mood also extends to the characters, who sometimes seem half-frozen themselves. When something suddenly jumps out, it carries a bigger shock. The movie's mood, which matches the ever drifting snow, is chilled and quiet, enhancing the quality of the scary scenes. Sometimes the movie plays right into them (as when one character decides to practice her ballet, alone, in the dark, with headphones on, while a killer is loose), and other times, nothing is what it seems. The feature directing debut by screenwriter Simon Barrett ( You're Next, The Guest, Blair Witch) - who also directed the wrapraound segment of V/H/S/2 - Seance shows a definite awareness of movie history and horror clichés. If only the killer knew when to shut up…not everything needs to be explained, especially to the one person who can stop you.Inspired by gory Italian horror classics, this hushed, wintry movie mixes things up and keeps viewers guessing by cleverly alternating supernatural, nightmare imagery with human-created scares. The rest is unremarkable slasher horror, though slickly-made and certainly watchable. ![]() However, Seance does come to a lively – and gory – conclusion, which helps us forgive lapses in credibility. The revelation during the final act is kind-of underwhelming, since once everything is explained – at-length! – the story loses some of its plausibility. ![]() Still, writer-director Simon Barrett does a decent job putting them through the paces, including some well-staged death scenes. Though earnestly performed, we’ve seen the outcast protagonist versus the bullying bitches in countless films since Carrie. It might be the work of the Edelvine Ghost, but the girls are made to suspect Camille.įor the most part, Seance walks a familiar path, right down to the characters. And sure enough, schoolgirls start dropping like flies, meeting untimely deaths in a variety of nasty ways. Instead, whoever they contacted tells them they’ll be next. Then a new student, Camille (Suki Waterhouse), is admitted and quickly earns the wrath of Alice’s clique (mainly because she doesn’t put up with their shit).īut later, Alice talks everybody – including Camille – into conducting a seance to contact Kerrie, hoping to learn what killed her. Their ritual is actually a ruse to scare classmate Kerrie, but she ends up dying in her dorm, leaving only cryptic clues as to what happened. And despite the title, it’s more of a slasher film than a ghost story.Īt a private girls school, several students led by mean-spirited Alice (Inanna Sarkis) “summon” the Edelvine Ghost, a former student who died at school and allegedly haunts the halls. Seance features a doozy of a talking killer, spending a good portion of the final act explaining the previous 75 minutes. This gives the hero ample opportunity to plot his escape or be rescued by a sidekick. Instead, he takes the time to either explain his nefarious plans in detail, or point-out where the hero screwed up. The late, great Roger Ebert coined the “Fallacy of the Talking Killer,” a time-honored trope where the villain has the hero trapped or cornered and all he has to do is shoot him. Stars: Suki Waterhouse, Madisen Beaty, Inanna Sarkis
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