Review of Lights Out (2016) by Bruno S — 08 Sep 2016

Making a feature length film based on a three minute short is by no means easy; it requires a more fleshed out story and motives, that would otherwise be absent in the shorter version and this isn't always a good thing, case and point: Lights Out.

Lights Out is a 2016 horror film based on the short video with the same name. It is directed by the same mastermind behind the beloved indie project and produced by famed horror director, James Wan who directed The Conjuring 2 earlier this year. It centers on the struggle between a little boy and his single mom who is suffering from depression and keeps talking to herself as if someone's actually there. Later, the sister tries to help the boy, but resents her mother for her crazy behavior, being that the reason why her dad left them in the first place. The main premise is that there is a ghost who creeps around the shadows and only appears in the dark, making it one of the best concepts of a horror film after "It Follows". Ironically, although the film has good performances and characters that we actually care about, it mostly suffers from what "It Follows" suffered, and that is the problem of how they are going to spend the 90 minutes with this simple yet effective concept, which can get repetitive after some time. Now, Lights Out doesn't have the same problems as It Follows because of this: while It Follows became the same thing over and over again with mostly forgettable characters, Lights Out just sheds too much light (pun intended) on the mystery of the ghost, making it less frightening the more you know about it. It's obvious that they needed a longer plot and the film itself it actually really short (its length being mere 81 minutes - as a comparison, The Conjuring 2 was 120min), but the way they laid out the ghost's backstory and motives, just made it less frightening as it went on. The Ring did a similar thing, but the Diana character's (this movie's ghost) motives, while interesting, aren't very effective compared to how mysterious she was in the short film. This is actually something Wan's films suffer from: he explains too much. Insidious 2 kind of ruined Insidious 1 by giving the "old woman" a backstory and, at the end of the day, this has the same problem. Actually, I would say that the 4min video had more of an impact on me than this feature film, and I'm not even exaggerating. With that said though, it is a good movie nonetheless and it's definitely worth the shot. Like I said, the characters are relatable and you actually worry for them and the concept is great because it uses something all of us fear at some point of our lives: the dark, because of the unknown things it hides from our vision. Some of the ways they used this concept were actually very creative at times and I think a lot of people will enjoy this lot.

At the end of the day, it might not be as effective as, let's say, it's short version, but it is certainly a good film nonetheless and one every horror movie lover should at least check out.