There was only one way to find out. I fired up Netflix, where It Follows streams, snuggled in for the night, and pressed "Play."
Summary:
A young woman (Maika Monroe) is stalked by a slow-moving, but ever-advancing malevolent presence. It was given to her, and the only way to get rid of it is to give it to someone else.* * * I have decided to depart from my usual format in order to talk about some of the things in this movie. These things are heavy, and should not be considered "good things" about the film. Instead, they are thought-provoking things. They may indicate that this film is not for you: I know people that would likely not enjoy this film for the very reasons I lay out below. TRIGGER WARNING: Assault, sexual assault * * *
Things to Think About:
Quick: At 100 minutes, this movie doesn't waste time, and doesn't overstay its welcome. I thought that David Robert Mitchell set up his story and executed it in just the right amount of time.Dat Soundtrack, Though: Disasterpeace's score is a thing of synth-laden glory. It fits the beating pulse of the story, step for step and turn for turn. It establishes creeping dread, boundless hope, and unflagging determination on the turn of a dime. This score is a joy to listen to, and one of the few full film soundtracks that I will frequently fire up on Youtube and listen to just because.
Anchored Performance: There is no denying that this is Monroe's show: her performance as Jay anchors the entire proceedings. She is vulnerable, powerful, frightened, and righteously angry in equal measure. Quite frankly, this movie does not work without a strong lead, and Maika Monroe provides an incredibly compelling, nuanced performance. Even when the script lacks proper character details, one can tell that Monroe has done her homework. She is supported in her endeavor by a cast of believable twenty-somethings that all strike a perfect balance: they all seem comfortable in their characters and sell the twists and circumstances of the movie capably.
Beautifully Shot: Writer/director David Robert Mitchell and cinematographer Mike Gioulakis have crafted a beautiful film. The camera moves in a smooth, elegant manner; it is the camera's very slowness and deliberateness that make the tension so great. Frames are cleverly balanced; lines and angles lead the viewer all over the surface of the image. The color is tuned up for a bright, lush visual feast. This is one of the best looking horror films I have ever seen, and I think it is due largely to the fact that it wasn't treated like one. It doesn't wallow in color-treated blues or washed-out colors: Mitchell and Gioulakis aren't afraid to dial up the vibrant reds and oranges of fall, or the cool wavy blue of a swimming pool, or the verdant greens of an abandoned neighborhood that's been left to seed. This movie is a stunning feat of gorgeous locations, clever camera work, and competent editing. And then there's the way the camera lingers on the background, daring you to see someone that doesn't fit. Someone that is walking, slowly, without pause, towards our hero. The camera often does 360 degree turns, showing you everything in the surrounding area. It establishes a sense of paranoia in the viewer that matches the growing dread in Jay.
Incredible Conceit: I've said it before: a great horror movie needs a great conceit: ghosts, demons, a haunted house, a ruthless killer, an ethereal cult. It Follows packs a whopper of a central conceit: there is a demonic presence that stalks you until it kills you. You catch it like some kind of supernatural STD. The only way to get rid of it is to pass it on to someone else. The first time I saw the movie I thought it was some kind of AIDS metaphor: the reckless passing of a death sentence from one person to the next. But the second time I watched it, something else clicked: It's about assault. Jay stands before a mirror and beholds her body in disgust after her date with Hugh: this pretty thing she might once have been proud of feels used and soiled. You see, Hugh dated her for some time before having sex with her, chloroforming her, and tying her to a wheelchair to explain the monster to her. Hugh raped her. Their sex was consensual, sure, but the circumstances were a lie, and Hugh inflicted a deadly consequence on Jay without her consent. And every sexual encounter thereafter, for Jay, is going to feel like rape, because she's signing a death warrant. Hugh's assault ripples outwards and threatens to infect all of Jay's friends, too. Sex becomes a death sentence, and the only way you can save yourself is to inflict death and fear on someone else. And that thing follows you. It is relentless. The film takes an otherwise beautiful, emotional act (sex) and turns it into a grisly form of calculus: how badly do you want to live? How many people would you kill to drag out the remainder of your own life? Yes, you were the victim of assault, but does that justify your own assault of other people? The creature in It Follows is doubly insidious, then, because it forces its victims to do its bidding. It makes its victims into aggressors. The film features a few sex scenes, but they are all robbed of emotion, and beauty, and any sense of titillation. There is no fun or joviality in this nudity (like in so many other horror films that seem to revel in it): it is either a tool of terror used by the creature, or it is a utilitarian act of survival for the infected (Jay). It robs life of all of its joy and replaces it with a creeping paranoia: when, and as who, will it come for me? It is implied, but not shown, that both Jay and Paul pass the creature on to strangers: Jay wades out into the lake to a boat with three men on it, and Paul is seen walking away from prostitutes. It is clever that the film refuses to show us whether or not Jay and Paul went through with these acts. How much longer can you root for someone who knowingly hands out death sentences to random people? Even here, it refuses to be an easy film. It refuses to give you pat answers. In many ways, the film encourages your own interpretation, your own experience of it. These actions, and even the ending of the film, are so ambiguous that every viewer will walk away with a different interpretation. Did they kill the creature? Yes and no. Did Jay and Paul pass it on to others? Yes and no. Are Jay and Paul being followed in the last frame of the movie, by some far away figure? Yes and no. I really like movies that dare you to engage with them in that way.
Three Princes: Jay is involved with three men throughout the film, and they represent three different kinds of relationships: Hugh/Jeff, Greg, and Paul. Hugh/Jeff is her assaulter: he gives her the monster. Greg is a predator: he sleeps with Jay and has a history of womanizing; he doesn't believe in the monster until it kills him. And then there's Paul: Paul who loves Jay, really and truly. Paul who believes her and wants to help her, and who, in the end, faces down almost-certain doom with her. This dynamic deepens the assault metaphor: had she known about Hugh, she probably never would have slept with him; Greg takes advantage of the situation to get some (his concern always seems a means to an end, rather than genuine care); she doesn't want to sleep with Paul, because she does actually care for him and doesn't want to inflict this on him. Three different men with three different ways of caring for Jay. Hugh, at the very least, explains the rules to her, and rationalizes that as care.
Unmoored in Time: One of my favorite things about this movie is how it has no definite time period. The costumes range from 50s, to 80s, to 90s and even early 00s. Jay's house is filled with ancient television sets, some stacked on top of each other (always playing black and white movies, no less). There are old cars all over the streets: and I don't just mean that beautiful classic car that Hugh drives. There are reliably beat up cars from the seventies and seemingly brand-spanking new cars from the 80s. The houses differ from early 2000s prefabbed to late 80s family homes, and even the crumbling abandoned neighborhoods hit by the recession, all broken windows and weed-festooned lawns. Then there's the clamshell e-reader: in a film filled with analog tech, one of the protagonists is constantly reading information on what looks like a clamshell compact make-up mirror, but what is actually some kind of advanced e-reader device. I'm not going to lie: I'd rather have this piece of cute tech than my iPhone. Then there's the seasons: Jay is frequently swimming in her (above ground) pool, but then wears winter coats about town. The leaves on the trees scream autumnal red and orange, but the lawn grass is spring-green. The film is unmoored in time, dreamlike, and it helps establish a sense of unease in the viewer.
Absent Authority: We very rarely see adults in this film. When we do see them, they are in far away shots, out of focus, or zoomed-in on until their faces are obscured. Or they are the creature. Jay's mom is almost never around, and, when she is, she is day drinking, constantly. The police who investigate the scene of Jay's assault are there for one scene, shrug their shoulders, and disappear entirely for the rest of the film. It is interesting, to me, that the film removes any adults from the situation. This is the kids' story. The adults can't, or won't, help them. Jay and her friends do what they want when they want and face little ramifications for it. Unless you count the creature: THAT'S a helluva consequence. This lack of authority necessitates that Jay, and her friends, grow up and begin to solve their own problems. Nevermind that this problem cannot be solved. And maybe that is ALSO the point: sometimes life throws evil at you and you just have to deal. The clear absence of any authority figure also adds to the dream-like quality of the film. It helps the film feel like some kind of urban fairy tale. A coming-of-age morality play.
Anyone, Anywhere: The thing that is so damn scary about this movie is the monster's ability to be anyone anywhere. It doesn't run. It just walks. Slowly forward. Towards your death. Inevitably. But it's smart: it can look like a loved one; it can look like a hapless old lady; it can terrify as a hulking monster; it can inspire sympathy as a ruined victim of assault. The creature seems to collect its victims (and their loved ones) and takes their form whenever it best suits its purpose. It uses nudity, too, in a mocking way: none of the nudity in this film is salacious. We get some bare breasts and a bit of full frontal from a man (in the form of the creature), but that nudity is never tempting. It's gross and unnatural. Like the creature itself. What a chilling, clever thing. The great thing about It Follows' creature is that it is shrouded in mystery. The characters seem to work out the basic rules of its behavior, but we never get long backstory, or extended research montages, or any real explanation for what it is or what it wants. It is nearly a force of nature, without cause or inspiration. It just is.
Food For Thought: Early in the film, Yara (Olivia Luccardi) reads a passage from Dostoevsky's The Idiot. It reads: "I think that if one is faced by inevitable destruction — if a house is falling upon you, for instance — one must feel a great longing to sit down, close one’s eyes and wait, come what may..." Later, Yara reads a second passage: "When there is torture there is pain and wounds, physical agony, and all this distracts the mind from mental suffering, so that one is tormented only by the wounds until the moment of death. But the most terrible agony may not be in the wounds themselves but in knowing for certain that within an hour, then within ten minutes, then within half a minute, now at this very instant – your soul will leave your body and you will no longer be a person, and that is certain; the worst thing is that it is certain." These are interesting picks to throw out in a horror film. How many scary movies do you know of that quote Fyodor Dostoevsky? And I slaved over how these quotes spoke to the movie, and why Mitchell decided to write them into his script. I have settled on this: these quotes, in tandem, help explain the unique hell that the creature thrusts whoever it has infected in. The creature is the collapsing house in the first quote: if you lay back and do nothing, it will kill you. Of course, standing up and running around inside the house looking for an escape is also pointless: the running and screaming is only a distraction. Doom is inevitable. Jay, and her friends, try desperately to outrun the creature, but they can't. She tries passing it to others, to no avail. They even try to kill the monster, but they cannot be sure that they did anything more than delay what was always coming from the get-go. It is entirely possible that, had Jay just laid down and died, she would have saved many people from undue torment. But she can't do that. It isn't human to do that. Hell, we'd have no movie if she did that. This movie posits that death is certain. Jay tries to distract herself with the "wounds," and the "suffering," and tries to escape, but it is certain. It was always certain, creature or no. She walks, hand-in-hand with Paul, at the end of the movie, into oblivion; into a life of uncertainty and paranoia. But she takes solace with Paul. They face doom together. And isn't that all you CAN do?
In Conclusion:
This is probably one of my longest reviews (apologies). I have two full pages of notes in my journal (scrawled all over the margins, too). It really is my favorite horror film. It is everything I want in a horror film: cleverly plotted, beautifully constructed, and challenging. Hell, I would go further and say that It Follows is not simply a great genre film: it is a great film, period.Should You Watch It?
Of all the movies I have reviewed this month, watch this one.Miscellany:
- The film had a budget of $1.3 million. It earned a cool $20 million box office.
- The movie sports a 97% score on Rotten Tomatoes, out of 238 reviews.
- The colors red and pink herald an attack by the creature.
- There are constant references to the core conceit of the movie: the kids play Old Maid (on a rad vintage deck of cards); there is a lot of imagery about balls being passed, hitting windows, in photographs, and literally bouncing down the street.
- Mitchell began writing the script in 2011, inspired by dreams he had when he was younger. Dreams of being followed.
- The movie sports a 97% score on Rotten Tomatoes, out of 238 reviews.
- The colors red and pink herald an attack by the creature.
- There are constant references to the core conceit of the movie: the kids play Old Maid (on a rad vintage deck of cards); there is a lot of imagery about balls being passed, hitting windows, in photographs, and literally bouncing down the street.
- Mitchell began writing the script in 2011, inspired by dreams he had when he was younger. Dreams of being followed.
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