It Follows Review
*Note: This review was written during the release time of It Follows
Directed by David Robert Mitchell
Written by David Robert Mitchell
“It could look like someone you know or it could be a stranger in a crowd”
I've heard how It Follows takes what looks like a typical horror film and turns it on its head, how it borrows from great classic horror films and how it's basically one of the best things to come out of horror cinema in many years. I was pretty excited to see it. Thanks to The Babadook my hope for modern horror films has been resurrected from the dead and if I could find another horror masterpiece in such a short time then the future might not be so bleak, horror wise anyway. Of course I needed to see this 'masterpiece' for myself, which I wish was easier to do. At the top of my cinema's currently showing list (which may I add is ordered by their recommendation) is The Boy Next Door...yeah. SEVEN whole films down is It Follows with far less showings even though it came out the same day. Plus, all the films it's under (which may I also add is actually ALL of the regular movies the cinema is showing) came out before It Follows. Except for one which came out the same day. This film is buried under older and in my opinion far less appealing films. This wouldn't be the first time a cinema has ignored this kind of movie so I didn't let that get me down, no I was pretty determined to see this film and I'm glad to say I did. But did all of this hype pay off? Let's talk about that.
Without getting into big spoilers let’s say the plot involves our main character Jay in the beginning of what might be seen as a blossoming relationship, of course anyone who has seen the trailer knows how that ends up. After a night of erm...passionate love making, our main protagonist is Chloroformed and tied up and told she's going to be followed by some dude at walking speed. Might not sound that scary but believe me it's pretty fucking terrifying. She's informed that if it catches her she's dead and that the only way to get rid of it to pass it on through sex, even then, when the person it's passed onto dies, it moves back onto the previously infected. By the way, if you've never had the infection, you can't see the stalker. At this point it might sound like a really elaborate porno script. but it definitely isn't handled like one. The rest of the film without going into great detail is our main girl, Jay and her friends who can't even see the stalker, Paul, Yara, Greg and Kelly (the few worth mentioning) trying to help Jay out and get rid of this thing, even if they don't all believe her and others have ulterior motives for helping. It's easy to not notice this but it's very much a teenager film, with the absence of parents and characters all talking about what it was like being kids, this is another thing the movie borrows some older horror films that follow the no parent formula. Suburbs, teenagers, a lake and a mad stalker, there's so much this film keeps classic but somehow makes it feel completely new. It follows apparently isn't set in a certain time, there's one thing that doesn't even exist and there's a lot of stuff that is decades old but I like to think it's set in the 80's. It's very much a teenager horror film with a lot more substance to it, which is great as most Teenager horror films these day are just, well...tits. It Follows is so rich that I don't even really think that the teenager thing is that important, I think anyone who enjoys good horror can enjoy this one very much.
Performance wise Maika Monroe who plays Jay is great. Rocking genuine terror and a girl next door vibe, Jay is easily a likable character though she might not have the most interesting personality, she's a character I'm very glad was the main lead. Unfortunately, she's not quite the top tier horror female protagonist level I would have liked. But I really look forward to seeing Maika in future roles and I'm even persuaded to check out some of her older ones. Paul is the salty kid who just wants to get some sugar, baby and the actor Keir Gilchrist does a great job in portraying this kind of character and playing a kid with a serious but realistic hard on for the main character but it's not like we haven't seen this before. Daniel Zovatto plays Greg, the older looking cool guy, who's all about the ladies, he does a fine job but once again, we've seen this. But these characters actually help this film feel more like its predecessors and like a lot of people said, It Follows is all about turning the horror stereotypes on their heads. Which I agree it does in some ways, maybe not with these characters but I don't think it would have pulled the other twists and turns as well as it did without them. Though now that I think about it, there's only two characters I really like and one of them I haven't even really mentioned.
It Follows is shot really well, with some really nice pan shots, some fantastic images and some so discreet moments happening in the background that you could even miss them. this film is filmed totally right. Though there were a couple moments I felt they missed out on some really cool shot ideas that would have made this film just that little bit more gripping. Not that it wasn't gripping, I found myself leaning out of my chair, just waiting for the next hair raising scare. I would like to mention a few of the shots are straight out of Halloween and Halloween II and it's a pretty fine line between an homage to those classics and just taking them.
The soundtrack to this film is put together by an artist called disasterpeace and it is beautiful, it's one of the most praised things about this film and I completely understand where all the hype is coming from. The synth-like tones are the perfect mix for this film, the mixture of nostalgic sounds and the ability to create appealing but eerie as hell music makes it the perfect soundtrack to It Follows. As amazing as it is, there is a few moments in this film where the music used seemed a little out of place, like they used it on the wrong scene or something but it's so enjoyable you find yourself not really caring about that.
So did It Follows live up to the hype? It isn't quite perfect but The sort answer is yes. Everything in this film works really well, the cast, the setting and the music all work and I don't really have any major problems with it, there's a few things that I think didn't really make sense but nothing big enough to piss me off like a lot of stupid little things in movies do. I love how this film is open for interpretation, I mean I think I have a pretty solid idea of what went down but I bet there's a lot of other theories, which makes any horror film better. I also love how this film can make you scared in the day time and how the whole idea of the terror from this film will be standing strong for a long time to come. It Follows is a genuine scare, it’s a really inventive anti-modern, modern horror film that actually deserves your money. I don't think it's going to be in cinema's for that much longer since it's pretty indie, so I recommend you get a group of friends and go watch It Follows and have a nice long conversation about this fantastic horror.
Rating: * * * * *
Better than > 90% of horror films for the past 5 years Worse than > The Babadook (Only just)
My faith in modern horror is officially restored, I'm looking forward to more from David Robert Mitchell and future horror films. We're even getting a new Guillermo Del Toro horror in Crimson Peak later this year.
