Oculus

I’m not a big fan of horror movies. I used to love them at some point in my life but now that I’m a bit grown up, they all seem jaded. Horror whether it’s in the form of a film, a story or by word of mouth was pretty scary but now, not so much. I remember the first time I saw M Night’s Signs starring the anti-sematic Mel Gibson; it was one heck of a scare movie. I remember not being able to sleep in my room for quite some time even to the point where my mom got really annoyed. The thing that makes a movie like Signs so scary is the fact that the main scare tactic or the “ghost” does not show that much; it’s all in the sounds and the vague imagery however Oculus does not reply on that tactic. Oculus shows the “ghost” full frontal, it’s scary but you’re reminded again and again by your brain that “this is a Hollywood movie” so naturally, it’s not that scary. How can it be scary when you know that all those rotten flesh on the “ghost’s” face are actually made of make up or Computer Generated Imagery? 

Oculus starts off normally, as any other horror movie would, a cliché of revenge and a narrative like someone got killed in the past, it was all a mistake and the outside world did not understand, now someone needs revenge but I gotta give the writers credit on a point that in Oculus, it’s not the “spirit” who wants revenge but the human. Kylie (Karen Gillan) had to witness the sad fate of her parents being possessed by a spirit from an antique mirror thereby killing each other’s also involving her younger brother Alan (Rory Cochrane) who with his father’s guidance shot a bullet through his father’s head. It’s some sort of a suicide since the father clearly pulls the trigger while Alan holds the pistol but none the less got him sentenced and a series of stint at the psych ward. Kylie seems to be the one who’s leading a normal life with a hot boyfriend however it turns out that the siblings promised each other’s that they would take revenge on the antique mirror for tearing up their family. So Kylie sets out on a mission with elaborate camera and Macbook set ups to prove that the mirror “makes you do things” after researching the mirror’s past thereby showing a series of really grotesque photos of “past victims”. There’s even a victim that died in her bath tub due to dehydration! And so the story builds up. On the other hand Alan is already convinced via his stint at the psych ward that all the actions were part of his “hallucinations”. I’m gonna stop narrating the plot here or else it’s gonna be a spoilers article again and I don’t want to get sued by Hollywood.

Even with the clichés and the very predicable plot line, Oculus is directed very beautifully. The writers sure did a lot of re writing particularly in the settings just to make it more relatable. I love the young Kylie, she’s so smart and brave and is the epitome of the brave role model sister I never had (I always wanted a bigger sister when I was young and even went as far as to lie to some school friends that I had a sister who would tell me all about her boyfriend) The movie also feels like it’s sponsored by Apple with the many Macbook product placements and the iPhone used to divide “reality” with the “ghost’s gimmick”. Well, by the second half of the movie, it gets blurred into reality and hallucination so the scene where Kylie takes out her iPhone to distinguish between the two world has Apple product placement written all over it or in other words, the writers re-writing the script to make it more relatable at the same time earning a bit of advert money for the studio. 

I like it when a movie clearly depicts that it’s a corporate product. Hate it when it tries to make it look indie while still being a huge corporate junk. Oculus never shies away from being the corporate product that it is and it’s also pretty entertaining, scary? Not so much but entertaining? Yes. It’s sort of like the Ring 2 which touched my heart (mother’s love) but scarier than it however not to the point of The Conjuring which was pure solid scare all throughout. The ending leaves a wide room for future sequels and I would totally watch Oculus part 2 if that’s ever produced.