I am
at my second Sundance Film Festival. These are my reviews.
Sundance Film Festival 2015 Reviews
It Follows DIRECTOR/SCREENWRITER: David Robert Mitchell PRINCIPAL CAST: Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist, Daniel Zovatto, Jake Weary, Olivia Luccardi, Lili Sepe
Plot (courtesy of Sundance): After a strange sexual encounter, a teenager finds herself haunted by nightmarish visions and the inescapable sense that something is after her.
Review: As a parent of a 2.4-year-old, I am nowhere near the "sex talk." Hopefully, I will remember to make It Follows part of my educational material. The "it" in It Follows is a presence that transfers through (unprotected I assume) sex, and lingers with terrorizing results.
Horror films are typically at their best when they under explain exactly what and how the evil works. That's just one of the things this film gets right. The music is spine-tingling techno that reminds me a little of the haunting vibe from Under the Skin. The camera work is very engaging, keeping you searching the screen, wondering where the scares will come. The cast of relatively unknowns (for me) is very solid. The middle of It Follows slightly suffers from the horror cliche of not believing in the evil that we the audience already knows to be true. Then there is just a touch too much time spent trying to find a guy who's just going to tell us the same thing he already told us. Those are small complaints that don't truly matter compared to the constant unease that lingers throughout this scary film.
Thankfully, a film about teenage sexuality doesn't dive into the ugliness of control and power, but instead will hopefully make people hesitate and take a second to make sure nothing, especially not it, follows.
Score: 8/10