Movie of the Week: It Follows

Alexa: Remember last week when I said I loved basically any and all horror movies when I was younger? I’m much pickier about my horror fare now, and “It Follows” fits the bill. I was entranced by this no-frills movie that does so much with so little. To me, the most effective horror movies are less about slasher violence and sudden scares that make you jump and more about unsettling psychological effects. The titular “it” is one frightening nightmare that never really ends, not even when you pass it on to someone else. There is always the possibility that it will kill whoever has it now, then kill the person who gave it to them until it gradually works its way back to you. The notion that something is always following you, that you can never really rest or feel safe, is quietly terrifying. Death is always lurking in the distance. In addition to the effective premise, I loved some of the stylistic choices writer-director David Robert Mitchell made here. The washed-out color palette, some of the clothes and cars, and the creepy synthesizer score feel very ‘80s, recalling some of the great thrillers from that era in a similar vein as “Stranger Things.” But “It Follows” obviously takes place in modern times - the girl in the opening scene uses a cellphone on the beach, and Yara has that weird seashell e-reader (what is it, and where can I get one?). Mitchell has said the movie was inspired by a recurring nightmare he used to have as a child, and that strange juxtaposition of past and present has a disorienting, dreamlike effect. My chief complaint is that the pace drags at times, but overall “It Follows” is a clever, compelling ride.

Joel: I really loved the feel of this movie. The story of the movie is driven by the creature that’s stalking Jay, but the tone of the movie seems to be driven by the dreamlike feeling that permeates through the whole movie. David Robert Mitchell, the director, has said that the idea of a person always, always following you came from a nightmare. And the whole movie feels like a dream, the way that the timeframe of the movie drifts. There’s cell phones and e-readers, but also, every television is a CRT model. Paul has a shelf that’s full of VHS, but Greg’s car has clearly been around for a while, as it’s an older beat up model. There’s even a scene in the hospital where the camera pans alongside the outside of the building. In one window there are nurses dressed in modern day scrubs, but as we pan to the left the next window shows a nurse dressed in 1950s attire. The ambiguous timeframe is clearly intentional, and it's adds a vague feeling of discomfort watching the movie.

It’s even difficult to pin down what time of year the movie takes place in. Once scene has Jay swimming in her pool under the summer sun, and in the next she’s bundling up to go to the movies. Just like a dream it seems to be one time, but another time as well, somehow at the same time. It can be slightly disorienting, but it’s meant to be and it really adds to the movie.

It’s incredibly easy to make Freddy or Jason pop out of nowhere, have a loud piano bang noise and scare the audience. But in this movie there are several shots where we see the creature walking toward Jay at a slow steady pace. Sometimes she sees it, sometimes she doesn’t, but the point is the audience sees it. It’s incredibly terrifying, and it’s impressive that the movie is able to make someone walking slowly toward camera as unsettling as it is. This is a really impressive horror film. One that doesn’t go for cheap scares, but instead really taps into a much more deep seated terror, and one that will make you want to look over your shoulder an extra time or two.

Chris: First thing that came to mind about this movie is how impressively this seemingly simple horror movie was shot. Clearly this was done by an ambitious director who found a balance between making the movie beautiful but not have that be a distraction from the purpose of the scene. The movie is meant to have you on edge for the majority of the movie even when there's not really a reason to. A good example of my point is when the cast goes to the high school to find the true identity of Jay's boyfriend. In any other movie, it would've been a simple shot of them in the office looking at a yearbook but in It Follows, the camera just continues to spin, each time zooming close to the kids in the office and creates tension in what ended up being a rather harmless scene. I appreciate that this movie knew it's strong points and simplified the rest. It's a time-honored theme in horror movies, the teens get punished by an evil being for having sex and often times when these movies have such a simple theme, the movie gets bogged-down in needless exposition. And that's the refreshing thing about It Follows, it never complicates itself, it doesn't weigh the audience down with the evil being's origin story and the exact rules of the evil being are left mostly ambiguous other than the sex clause. All those details can be explored in a sequel but I'm glad it was left out and really added to the confusion and paranoia that keeps the audience engaged for the duration of the movie. And honestly, it sounds like the evil being just wants to get laid and assumes the best way to achieve that is to go after attractive teens that already has a sexual history. Oh man, is this movie secretly a metaphor about the dangers of slut-shaming? This just got interesting.

Jason: So that was a thing I just watched. I'm not really sure where to start. Teenage actors are the worst. And this movie goes to prove that. The acting here is just awful. There is no emotion on any of their faces at any point, even when they should be in the throws of passion or terrified out of their heads. Conversations felt like cardboard. I don't know if it was a stylistic choice or what but I could not pin down anything in this movie. What year is it set? All the cars look old but they have cell phones and that one chick is reading what appears to be a scallop. They go to a theater with a pipe organ. But the handgun they use is a modern model. So lost.

Also, at the end I was left with more questions than I started with. What are the rules of this curse? Can you pass it to more than one person? What actually has to happen to pass it on? Can a girl give it to another girl? What is the significance, if there is any, to the form the thing takes at any given time? And most importantly, why aren't any of the characters asking any of these questions?!? And why don't they just start carrying a jar of glitter? Thing gets too close, *POOF*! Visible specter.

In conclusion, all I could think about throughout this movie was Gavin Free’s “Snail Assassin” scenario. It's basically the plot of this film. Remember kids, if you do the sex, you’ll be killed by a shapshifting demon ghost thing.