Dans le noir

Its brilliance lies in its simplicity. Lights out doesn't attempt to confuse anyone, nor does it look to introduce a totally original idea. Instead, it boldly and unambiguously taunts the audience with the message, "you were all afraid of the dark as kids and most of you still are."

Never has a scary movie villain had such an easy foil—light. Literally any kind of light—sun, fluorescent, bright. They each work perfectly well. Shine any sort of light in the direction of this movie's monster and she disappears. Poof. She's gone and everyone is safe. Writing this, I recognize that this doesn't sound even the tiniest bit scary. Yet somehow, as I sat in my well-lit house after watching the movie, I felt afraid.

A brief telling of the plot: there's a monster-demon-ghost-girl named Diana that lives only in darkness because light hurts her, and sometimes she kills people. She haunts other people in the movie who try to not be killed by her and also they try to defeat her. That's really all there is to know. Yes, it's a very simple plot, but still an enjoyable one, at least in this instance.

Something about the beautiful simplicity of the scare tactics just worked. Nothing confusing, nothing shocking. There weren't even very many classic hanging suspense moments interrupted by loud, jolt scares. These we textbook jump scares. A seemingly safe moment with normal amounts of sound that slowly drifts to silence then POW! A jump scare.

You may be thinking, "this sounds lame. How does this brutally basic approach yields effective scares?" Great question, my astute and thoughtful reader.

I've thought about this question and come up with a few explanations. First, we owe a tremendous credit to the actress who played Diana (Alicia Vela-Baley). Her intimidating posture and sickly contorting and Freddy Kruegerish flailing arms bring to life a terrifying character, whose mere presence on screen is enough to leave viewers unsettled. There's something about crouching, and Vela-Baley is great at it. Seeing a person crouch in a well-lit area is comical. But looking at a crouching figure in the shadows, that will make your skin crawl. The other explanation that I will offer is the visceral nature of the scares. Much of the movie takes place in the dark and the dark is scary. We are evolutionarily predispositioned to fear the dark. It's a survival instinct. Don't argue with me on this. I'm right.

Anyway, the dimly-lit, shadowy settings are the perfect playground for visceral and pure jump scares. Director David F. Sandberg hits all the right beats in framing and lurking camera movement to maximize this simple and smart approach.

So, that's it. If you can't stand jump scares or scary movies, don't see Lights Out. Honestly, I'm not sure why you're even reading this review if you don't like scary movies. If you do like jump scares and scary movies, watch Lights Out. And maybe buy a couple extra lightbulbs or a nightlight before you do.

It wasn't until I checked the credits that I realized this was based off of the short film by David F. Sandberg. I knew the lights off/lights on shadow figure thing seemed familiar. While I really loved the short film, I don't necessarily agree that it needed the full length treatment. I feel like we see this a lot - capitalize off some popular internet thing that, when extended, loses some of what made it special in the first place. The short film was unsettling and creepy as it was; giving it a back story and more detail made it feel cheapened. I'm not a huge fan of "BOO!" gotcha horror movies, though; I come from a generation that was raised on the original Halloween and, for me, that is the apex of subtle, creepy, slow burn etc - everything that makes one get enveloped in a movie. When there are two many jump-atchas, it is jarring and does not make for high replay value (for me, anyway). I thought the mental asylum backstory was so played out; I feel like maybe that trope should be burned alive. We get it. Although that's kind of how I also feel about kids being creepy (or "troubled"), too. There's just so little variation in horror these days. Not all bad, though - I feel like the choice of Teresa Palmer as Maria Bello (Sophie)'s character's daughter was a fantastic choice. I not only enjoyed her performance but I feel she looks the part; she looks like a younger version of her.

This movie will get your pulse up fast, revealing the "horror" very early on. Interestingly enough, it keeps that pulse up throughout the movie despite of this. The concept of something that can only appear and be seen if it's dark (and with a somewhat supernatural ability to destroy light bulbs) is bound to lead to a jump scare or ten whenever it appears. Towards the end you've almost gotten so used to it that the scare effect wears off a bit, and is one of two reason I don't rank this a 10. But thanks to a good story and good actors, the movie still holds its ground to the very end.

The characters are really good, well written and performed, and with a young boy that if not before, totally kick started his future acting career with this movie. Who doesn't love a young prodigy? The plot has some weight and emotion to it, and with a solid ending that wraps things up in a much more satisfying way than most similar movies.

The other small drawback with this movie for me was mostly because of slightly unrealistic behavior from our main characters, occasionally. Like when miss heels from Jurrasic World is worried that when she releases T-Rex it won't be able to follow her if she runs. So, she waits for it to come close, walks for a bit, then runs. Those kinds of unrealistic behaviors. But I've seen much worse, and this movie doesn't take the "unrealistic" very far, or often, so I suggest you just put this on and roll with it!

All in all you get everything you want from a jump scare movie with Lights Out, with a good plot and good actors that deliver, and a scare factor we all can relate to. You might not be so happy with turning of your lights going to bed later that night, so if you have a weak stomach you might wanna sit this one out.

Lights Out is an interesting stab at a horror movie based on a 2013 short film of the same name. The movie's novel concept is a creature that can only be seen and manifest in the dark. Turn a torch on, and it disappears. Naturally, this means that a lot of the movie is spent in the dark but this works well.The use of lighting is one of the movie's strong points and allows for some creative, and occasionally funny, uses of torches, candles and even car headlights. This technique generates a lot of the scares and atmosphere and given the movie's title, this is a must. Definitely top marks for the director on this part.

Teresa Palmer and Gabriel Bateman do well in the lead roles as the unfortunate kids with a crazy mother, played by Maria Bello. The problem with the movie is that apart from its main concept, it doesn't add much else. Clichés abound and yes, there is the mandatory dark basement (groan). Most of the scares are jump-out-at- you shocks and it's all been done before. Hollywood seems to have forgotten how to use psychological horror and churns out movies that are just twists on the same theme. This is probably a bit harsh as the movie is enjoyable enough and it's well-written, but I long for something new that isn't so long in the tooth.

The supernatural horror is effective and does elicit a genuine threat to the characters. Maria Bello, in particular, does well to ramp up the threat levels and makes you wonder who is going to make it out alive. As already mentioned, this was based on a short film and it really still is, coming in at around 80 minutes. Perhaps there wasn't enough material to make a longer movie but there's a feeling that it ends just as it gets going.

Lights Out is a decent film if you feel the need for a dash of supernatural horror but don't expect anything stand-out; it just doesn't deliver enough of a impact to make it memorable. It's good for what it does but don't buy too much popcorn as you may not have time to finish it.

Lights out really is a great modern horror film. It offers great thrills and also offers wonderful acting. Every actor did their job beautifully and the characters they portray are well constructed, they are not just surface level, cardboard cut out characters. The visuals are good, the darkness and the creepy eeriness effect of a lot of scenes work very well. There are some scenes that may even be somewhat hard to watch because of the utter creepiness. Diana and the visuals that make her up are done very well and the horror is real here, it's not cheap or cheesily boring. The opening of the film is also very effective in its attempt to be truly scary. This movie isn't very gory or overly grotesque either, it has a minimal amount of blood/gore, and some violent images, but not a whole whole lot, which it good and a wise decision by the filmmakers, because if a scary movie is too gory or overly disturbing, then it can be distracting from the plot. You want people focused on the plot of the movie and on what's going on, not on the ridiculous amount of gore. Lights out receives an 8/10 on my scale.