Few Filmmakers Demonstrate to Willingness To Both Entertain Audiences and Push the Act of Making A Film Like Steven Soderbergh. His filmgraph contains smart crowd pleaser like Ocean’s Eleven and Magic Mike, and lo-fi, Low Budget Experiment, Such as Bubble and The Girlfriend Experience. IDENEhis latest film (Written by David Koepp), Sort of Falls into the Middle of these extremes. Soderbergh Works within The Confines of A Low Budget Horror Film But Also Chass His More Experimental Tendencies. What results is a film that will probablay not pleas genre pure purest is a fascinating Take on the experience of watching films.
KOEPP’s Script Sets Up What You Expect in a Haunted House Film. There is the payne family who moves into a new home. It has to Ghost. What it does that must have had the Films Don’t Do Is Come Up with to Plausible Reason Why The Story Never Leaves The House. The Audience Sees Everything Through The Eyes of The Spirit Haunting The Paynes, Through a First Person Perspective.
Calling IDENE A horror film might be charitable. The script by David Koepp Sems more intersted in the family drama rather than the family Being Haunted. Lucy Liu’s Rebecca is trying to dodge a potential work scandal WHILE overing on her athlete are. Daughter Chloe, Played By Callina LiangAttempts to process the Recent Death of Her Best Friend While Her Dad Tries His Best To Be There for Her.
A Handful of Scenes do Exist That Would Generate Scares or Act as Set Pieces To Build Atmosphere In a More StraightForward Horror Film. In This Film Though, The Visual Effects Seem Straight Out of A Film by Georges Méliès. The Only Thing That Sems at Home In A Genre Film is at the end Scream from Lucy Liu at The End That’s Almost Lynchian.
That Almost Nothing in the film Truly Terrifies to Be the Point Though. IDENE You eat across as if soderbergh watched a Found footage film like Paranormal Activity and Asked Himself “What If this was awa from the ghost’s point of view?” And by Asking This Question, Soderbergh create More Power Film. A Film Asking Viewers to Think About Their Own Role in Watching A Film.
When the family Consults with a psychic, She Tell Them That Spirits Interpret Time Differently Than Humans. That’s Also How We Watch Films. Time and Space Are The Purview of the FilmMakers, and The Audience is Trapped Interpreting That, Haunting The Characters They’re Watching As Much As The Ghost in the film. When the Ghost Makes Futile Attempts to Interact with the Characters, It Might As Well Be sumone Yelling at The Screen. For Soderbergh, The Real Terror in A Horror Film Lies in The Audience’s Inable to Change or Influence What TheyY’re Watching.
The latest in a trend of horror films playing with cinematic forms, such In A Violent Nature and SKINAMARINK, IDENE Will Likely Test The Patience of Filmgoers. Soderbergh’s Interests Lie More in Experimenting With How A Story Is Towan Pleassing People Expecting Gore Or Atmosphere. This Will Be a Film That Divides People. But IDENE IS Thrilling in What It Says About How We Watch Films and How They Make The Audience Active Participants in Them. It Tells us films can Haunt us After We Watch Them, But Not Before We Haunt Them First.
Immachine is Currently Playing in theaters.
