Lights Out (2016) Review
Lights Out plays out its scare potential within the first five minutes and never really thrills again. It’s a concept rather than a fully-fledged film. It’s film making by numbers. For example the film’s scene-setting opener is set in a mannequin warehouse after hours, why in a mannequin warehouse? Because mannequins can look a little eerie and therefore the setting has been picked for scare potential rather than actually provide a genuine scare instead.
The lead character’s estranged father Paul (Billy Burke) works at the warehouse. He’s not alone, his co-worker Esther (Lotta Losten, the director’s wife, who appeared in the original short) is also present. Upon switching off a light off Esther notices the dark shape of a woman with rather long fingers lurking in the doorway. Switching the light back on the figure disappears only to appear to have moved closer when the lights go out again. Yep OK we’ve got it! The figure is only visible when it’s dark.
Upon being startled by the figure does Esther freak out or call the police (not that they could do a lot, but it would still feel a natural reaction, no matter how nonsensical it may seem to do so)? No, Esther simply warns Paul and then buggers off home. If I had seen the same I would be hysterical and in need of calming down. Herein lies a huge problem with Lights Out, the ominous figure is treated by the characters, in general, as just one of those things, as if seeing such a figure is not a cause for anything more than a warning. Warning or no warning Paul is gruesomely dispatched anyhow. Paul’s stepdaughter Rebecca (Teresa Palmer) chooses not to live with her mother Sophie (Mario Bello) and stepbrother Martin (Gabriel Bateman), preferring to live alone in an apartment. Her choice to live alone is enforced by her refusal to let her long-term partner Bret (Alexander DiPersia) stay the night let alone have him move in. It’s believed that Rebecca’s mother is suffering with a mental illness and has an imaginary friend. She has, but her’s is no Harvey, her imaginary friend is called Diana (Alicia Vela-Bailey), only Diana is not so imaginary as Martin sees her too. Consequently Martin is not sleeping (now that’s better, a more natural response to the horror), the result of which sees him falling asleep in class. Rebecca is contacted to pick Martin up and upon intending to drop her sibling off at home with his mother, gets into a verbal with her matriarch figure and takes her brother home to stay with her instead.
It’s not long before Diana makes her presence known to Rebecca, attacking her when the light is switched off, but rather than feeling disgruntled at not getting to slash Rebecca to death, Diana takes the time to scratch her own name on the floor, whatever for? Gives her something to do I suppose, plot-wise it’s yet another spoon-feed for the audience and nothing more. Rebecca doesn’t freak, she remains as nonplussed as everyone else, except Martin, seems to be be. But hey, Rebecca has been here before, Diana was present during her childhood and led to her father abandoning them. Rebecca tells Martin, who, remember is already having trouble sleeping, about Diana (another exposition-heavy piece), great for exposition but surely this would just unnerve poor Martin more! One more attack from Diana later and Rebecca gets to thinking about sorting out this long-present spectre once and for all.
Writer/director David F. Sandberg’s original three-minute short, upon which this is based (also called Lights Out), went down a storm on the internet. This led to offers from Hollywood for Sandberg to expand his original concept into a feature-length film. Both When a Stranger Calls (1979) and The Babadook (2014) were originally based on short films and expanded for the bigger screen, however where those two manage to do something with the premise, Lights Out feels horribly stretched. I find it difficult to see how the sequel, and no doubt subsequent franchise, will fare given that pretty much every so-called surprise has been covered first time round. There’s nothing new to learn about Diana either. Given the terrific box office, especially in North America, it seems mediocrity is all it takes now to launch a franchise.
I couldn’t buy into the premise, to ground such a premise you need the viewer buy into its logic. Lights Out stretches credibility and becomes irritating. This is one of those films where just when a character needs it they find a cassette recording from some thirty years ago in a player that not only still plays, but happens to be ready to play at the precise point that details are given to move the thinly sketched plot along. Lights Out is one of those flicks reliant on ‘BOO’ moments regardless of whether anything else actually makes any real sense at all. Disappointing.
