Oculus- Horror or Thriller? Reality vs Fantasy?
As you all know, I’m a supernatural kind of horror movie guy. I enjoy the gory slasher films too. Its just that something about the supernatural intrigues me….it’s a sense of the unknown that can terrify a person to no end. This is the essence of terror. This is what I left with the film I just saw this past week.
Oculus is a supernatural horror film centered around two people…a brother and a sister who have been through a traumatic experience as children. They were witness to the deaths of their parents and it all seemed to center around an old antique mirror which was in good ol’ Dad’s den. After the murders the kids were separated and the son sent to an institution. The girl moves on but still struggles with her past. Eleven years later, Tim is deemed fit to reenter society and is released to his sister Kaliye. Little did he know that Kaylie has been busy while he was away.
Using high tech instruments, computers and seriously heavy research, Kaliye brings her brother and the mirror (which she bought off at an auction), back to their ill fated house where that tragic night occurred. The mission: Destroy the mirror. The reason? Kaliye is convinced there is a supernatural presence which has been responsible for the deaths of about 45 people within a several hundred year time period….including driving her parents insane. The set up the mirror in its former spot in their father’s old den and the mission begins.
What I found interesting about this movie was and I have to be honest….it wasn’t scary. It didn’t even make me jump once. But it intrigued me mentally. If there was some kind of supernatural presence in that mirror which actually knew how to screw with people’s heads to make them think they were doing things they were in fact not doing and going places they were in fact not going, it did a pretty good job of it. In fact, after a while even I wasn’t sure anymore what was really fantasy in the film or what was really happening to our main characters. It’s as if the mirror sucked me right into the confusion with them. I liked that.
We also get a series of flashbacks from eleven years ago when these heinous and terrifying events allegedly took place with the mother and father. It helped give me a clearer understanding as to why our two heroes were doing what they were doing and why. Tim was very resistant from the start. He truly believed that the problem was him…that he was treated and was better now. It didn’t seem right for his sister to drag him back to the same house and mirror after all these years simply to finish the job they started. He didn’t want any part of it. Yet as the movie progresses he begins to see it for what it was….or was it?
That’s what this film left me with. Was the whole thing a real supernatural presence or was it in your head? The film, even though it leaves you with a sort of cliff hanger, surely left me with the question of what was real and what was the mirror. Maybe it was a little bit of both.
I give Oculus 2 coffee cups. Its worth a view but not worthy of my library. It’s more of a psychological thriller than it is a horror movie. If you do in fact get to see it, keep in mind that both characters in the film come across as a reflection of the viewer of the movie. The skeptic vs the believer. Reality vs fantasy. Which one is it? The movie ultimately leaves that decision to us.
Oculus is a supernatural horror film centered around two people…a brother and a sister who have been through a traumatic experience as children. They were witness to the deaths of their parents and it all seemed to center around an old antique mirror which was in good ol’ Dad’s den. After the murders the kids were separated and the son sent to an institution. The girl moves on but still struggles with her past. Eleven years later, Tim is deemed fit to reenter society and is released to his sister Kaliye. Little did he know that Kaylie has been busy while he was away.
Using high tech instruments, computers and seriously heavy research, Kaliye brings her brother and the mirror (which she bought off at an auction), back to their ill fated house where that tragic night occurred. The mission: Destroy the mirror. The reason? Kaliye is convinced there is a supernatural presence which has been responsible for the deaths of about 45 people within a several hundred year time period….including driving her parents insane. The set up the mirror in its former spot in their father’s old den and the mission begins.
What I found interesting about this movie was and I have to be honest….it wasn’t scary. It didn’t even make me jump once. But it intrigued me mentally. If there was some kind of supernatural presence in that mirror which actually knew how to screw with people’s heads to make them think they were doing things they were in fact not doing and going places they were in fact not going, it did a pretty good job of it. In fact, after a while even I wasn’t sure anymore what was really fantasy in the film or what was really happening to our main characters. It’s as if the mirror sucked me right into the confusion with them. I liked that.
We also get a series of flashbacks from eleven years ago when these heinous and terrifying events allegedly took place with the mother and father. It helped give me a clearer understanding as to why our two heroes were doing what they were doing and why. Tim was very resistant from the start. He truly believed that the problem was him…that he was treated and was better now. It didn’t seem right for his sister to drag him back to the same house and mirror after all these years simply to finish the job they started. He didn’t want any part of it. Yet as the movie progresses he begins to see it for what it was….or was it?
That’s what this film left me with. Was the whole thing a real supernatural presence or was it in your head? The film, even though it leaves you with a sort of cliff hanger, surely left me with the question of what was real and what was the mirror. Maybe it was a little bit of both.
I give Oculus 2 coffee cups. Its worth a view but not worthy of my library. It’s more of a psychological thriller than it is a horror movie. If you do in fact get to see it, keep in mind that both characters in the film come across as a reflection of the viewer of the movie. The skeptic vs the believer. Reality vs fantasy. Which one is it? The movie ultimately leaves that decision to us.
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