johnlink ranks THE POSSESSION (2012)
It is now October, which means that I will be giving any Halloweeny type movie a chance. My standards drop significantly in search for that diamond in the rough. I’ve found a few over the years. Not enough to make this a sane proposition, but enough to keep me going. Would THE POSSESSION be such a find?
I watched THE POSSESSION (2012) on 10.3.14. It was my first viewing of the film.
THE POSSESSION is a movie about a divorced family struggling to establish their relationships while fighting off a demon ,who lives in a box, actively trying to possess their child. If one complaint about horror movies is that they often ignore character in order to beef up on the scares per minute, THE POSSESSION is a movie which attempts to buck this trend (Peter Hartlaub, in the San Francisco Chronicle, gives the movie a negative review while calling it “Kramer vs. Kramer vs. Lucifer”).
This isn’t, however, some highly successful drama. The story is not all that complex. A father (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) who is a college basketball coach with ambition, just had a divorce finalized with his wife (Kyra Sedgwick). She has begun seeing someone else, he is holding out hope. They have two daughters. The high school aged one is Hannah (Madison Davenport), the middle school aged girl is Em (Natasha Calls). It is Em that the demon takes over after she finds an inoperable wooden box at a yard sale.
The movie takes its time getting to the scary stuff, at least after the obligatory pre-credits intro. Once it gets there, this is a movie which goes more for creepy than gruesome or jump-scary. This is a religious possession movie, with the rapper Matisyahu playing the Orthodox Jewish savior trying to help end the ordeal. This is, at least, an original thought. Perhaps it isn’t all that original to just movie THE EXORCIST into a Jewish story and tell it from that perspective, but the movie at least tries something new.
The acting is fine, but not anything noteworthy. Nobody embarrasses themselves. The cinematography is often interesting, even if it becomes a little redundant to begin every establishing shot with a camera spinning above whatever buildings we are about to see inside. Overall, though, the film sets up some nice things for us to look at, and provides more than a few interesting visuals. The CGI may leave a little to be desired, but it isn’t entirely terrible either.
So what this is, then, is a fine enough possession movie which will entertain for 90 minutes and probably be quickly forgotten. It is not nearly as terrible as some of the movies in this genre, but it is no way a top title. In the month of October, when searching for quick hit horror titles, you could do worse.
SCORES
FILM: 6; MOVIE: 7; ACTING: 6; WRITING: 6
6+7+6+6+0=25
FINAL SCORE: 6.25 out of 10
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