Movie Appraisal: Oculus (2013)

It is late at night, and I just finished this movie. And I don't know what to do. I'm not alone in my apartment. I shouldn't feel this nameless fear striking me in the gut. My fiancee, who does not like horror movies, is asleep in the bedroom as I write this review. She did not watch the movie either. She probably does not even know that I watched it.

I only say that because I am not even alone here, and yet I feel more alone after watching this movie than I have in a very long time. I have, for the past two years, done as little as possible with the horror genre. Sure, I've watched a few movies that I've definitely watched and reviewed on this blog before, And I've played a few horror video games as well. But for the most part my life has been devoid of horror because I like saying my thoughts on this blog about horror movies, and couldn't bring myself to watch them without being able to write a review up. It's my own failing really. I could have watched them and not had my life of loving horror movies on pause, but I felt that the new horror movies I would watch should have a fresh experience of review, rather than a review of someone who has definitely seen it more than once.

I'm explaining myself too much. Suffice it to say, I was thoroughly terrified by this movie.

It succeeded in being both very scary and extremely unsettling. I'm not sure if I'll be able to sleep tonight. And that's great because I love great and scary horror movies. It's also terrible because I have work tomorrow and my fragile mind should not have to deal with this much psychological horror all at once.

I guess I should get started with my extremely positive review of this film. Oculus is brilliant. This is exactly the type of movie I search for, especially in the more "mainstream" horror movies. It's exactly the type of movie I spend my waking hours seeking. The whole "very old object" horror works so well. It is almost Lovecraftian in nature, something beyond the scope of human ken. And that's a huge reason why this movie works so well for me.

Oculus is directed by Mike Flanagan, the man who also directed Absentia, a movie I look back on a lot more fondly than my review does, I'll say that much. It could be that I think better of it because Doug Jones himself commented on a blog post I had written up for the movie, or maybe I just have a very fond memory of the tunnel idea itself. I still do not think it is a wonderful movie, but time has been kind in my mind to it. So, seeing another movie by the same director was exciting for me. It's seeing how somebody has grown and developed over time.

And grow Mike Flanagan did. His directing chops are really quite something to behold. And so is this film.

The word "oculus" is Latin, It usually means "orb" or "eye." But it can also mean "eyesight" and a couple of other less relevant things. I'm kind of a Latin nerd. Sorry. But I find it fascinating that they focused on a word that means "eye" as the title of the film. I think it might be one of the most telling parts of the movie itself.

Anyway, the plot revolves around a brother and sister, whose parents were both killed when the siblings were younger. Their mother was "tortured" and killed by their father, and their father was killed by the brother, Tim. Tim is put into a mental hospital, which he stays until eleven years later on his twenty-first birthday as the film begins. The sister, Kaylie (played by a manic Karen Gillan), believes that she has all the answers to what happened all those years ago, and she recruits her brother to help her citing the promise they made to one another years before of destroying the evil that plagued their family.

And there's the premise. The thing that Kaylie blames for all their troubles is a very old antique mirror that her parents had purchased and put into her father's study. And the mirror is the true source of "evil" or malignancy or whatever you want to call it. It makes both parents go mad in different ways, but the children don't seem to go mad, not until they have become adults and try to best the mirror themselves.

The film blends both past and present together seamlessly. It is a wonderful mixing of time periods into this terrifying story. It messes with one's own perceptions when watching the film. I love the psychology that has been taken into account in the movie, talking about fuzzy memories  and blocks in the mind. The mirror uses weaknesses and strengths against the siblings and all whom it comes into contact. And that is truly terrifying.

Oculus is a cross between 1408 and Sinister or maybe Insidious or something. That sounds like a vague comparison to make, but there are a great deal of these movies that have come out recently that have very similar design and conceptual qualities to them. It is definitely mainstream-ish 2010s horror is my ultimate point here. I hope that doesn't sound like an insult. While current horror is not my favorite horror to watch, there really have been some amazing gems that have come out in well-known movies. It just so happens that a lot of these movies, if popular, get endless sequels that beat the premise into the ground like a hammer to a stake.

And that is the real problem of these well made and original horror movies. Sequels will ruin the novelty and brilliance of these ideas if given the chance. But, I will say that I am glad that I have avoided most of the 2010s horror sequel craze. So, there's that, at least.

Anyway,  I have to say that this movie was something I wasn't expecting, I can't even deal with the ending right now after just watching it. I won't spoil it here. But having it comparable to 1408 was not a bad thing to me. It just happened to be a lot worse in the end. Maybe. It's hard to say.

I have a few more musings before I wrap up. Obviously, because I liked it, I really don't want to spoil it for anybody. I had heard nothing but recommendations for this movie. And that's all I really have to say about it. The film is really excellent at getting its points across, and while it gets really heavy-handed with some of its ideas, it also is very subtle in its approach of character building, especially if you consider the mirror one of the characters.

Anyway, random musings time. There was a reference to a "South Windham Whale" in the movie as Kaylie is listing the history of the mirror. This reference is an oddity for me specifically. I know the majority of the readers here will literally not think twice about the reference as anything but a one-off joke. But I grew up in a town right next to South Windham, Connecticut. I know that town like the back of my hand. So, it's weird to hear it mentioned in a pretty major horror movie motion picture thing. It doesn't happen very often, and it made me regard the movie with a bit more interest.

It is terrifying and so well put together as a movie. I haven't seen a new horror movie this good in quite the long time, probably three or four years at the least. Holy hell is it good though. I loved this movie from every angle. It is superb storytelling. It gets you involved, . The movement between the past and the present is seamless, and I can't state that enough.

Anyway, it is a strong recommendation. If you are sensitive to gore, realize that, while there isn't a ton, there definitely is some vicious moments of it in passing. But beyond that, I can't say enough good things about it.

Video Game Assessment: Demon's Souls (2009)

Demon's Souls, developed by From Software with some assistance from SCE Japan Studio, is an interesting action-adventure-RPG-hack-and-slash-very-hard-game that looks like it helped kick off the "hard games" genre that seems to be pushing itself into video game culture today. Some people (mostly jerks) say that this game is easy. Other people (the jerks would call them "noobs" which is literally the dumbest thing a human being can possibly say with a straight face) think that this is a difficult and punishing game, designed to be both psychotically frustrating when you get angry enough to throw your PlayStation 3 controller through the game disc and incredibly rewarding once you defeat anything that has given you problems (for me it was Flamelurker, that wobbling flaming monkey moron).

This game was my first real foray into this genre. Sure, I like difficult games at times, hard to grow up on the NES and the SNES and not get used to difficult games. But this one, it's very different. And it's difficult in a different way. It's fair, sure, and can be easy through repetition and memorization. Mostly though, it punishes through lack of knowledge, lack of skill, and pulling out surprise after surprise. You need amazing control for this game. You have to have a knowledge base of what's coming, and you have to get used to the controls, which are, at the very least, difficult to figure out at first. There are also a great deal of hidden mechanics in the game, like leveling up (which I didn't find when I should have found it), what the stats mean, and what the symbols that are required to use a weapon actually mean. To be bluntly honest, this game confused me for a good long time, and I left it alone much of the time I owned it. But that changed early this year. Because that was when I decided I had enough of the namby-pamby games. I was a real gamer-boy, and I was going to game.






(And then hate myself for a long time afterward...)

Prepare to Cry
(in anger)

I had gotten this game not long after it had come out, played a little bit, and found it too frustrating to continue. I hadn't even beaten or even gotten to the first real boss in the game, but I found it too tiresome to proceed, and put it off for another two years or more. I came back to it, tried to show off just how hard the game was, proceeded to get frustrated and then put it off again.

Finally though, I'd had enough. With work a mounting priority and no time for anything else, I decided to dip my toes into the fires of self-hatred and punish myself directly. I started by playing about an hour each night, more or less, just seeing what I could do. The controls (which I barely knew trying it before) seemed to feel a bit better in my fingers this time around. I somehow beat the first level, 1-1, and I never died to the first boss Phalanx, something I didn't know I had in me. And from that moment, I was hooked. Sure, there were frustrations, times when I knew I wouldn't be able to continue and times that I simply told myself I was done. But I did continue; I wasn't done. The Tower Knight gave me problems. Because the character I had created four or five years previous had already beaten the tutorial, I didn't have the tutorial to fall back on. I forgot that I could run and therefore never ran once in the entirety of Demon's Souls. How I got past the red dragon in the second level of the first world, I have no idea. I dodge rolled a lot. I like dodge rolling. Maybe that saved me. Or maybe some incredibly dumb luck (with an emphasis on the dumb) was on my side. I was still struggling even throughout the first part of the game. The first four bosses (with the exception of Phalanx) gave me trouble. But I beat them all one by one, remembering their names in turn: Tower Knight, Fool's Idol, Armored Spider... and Flamelurker. How I loathe thee, Flamelurker.

Flamelurker was the boss that got me in this game. It was the hardest and most frustrating one. I was playing a melee character with extremely limited magic and no range. I subsequently had to change my build because of this boss, become nearly a pure bows and magic character. It was frustrating. I keep using that word, but it describes the experience so well. It captures the experience perfectly. Frustration. Rewarding frustration. I won, and after that nothing stood in my way. I was on a roll. The Maneater(s) gave me some issues, but I beat them too. I beat everything. After Flamelurker, everything clicked. The combat clicked. The game mechanics clicked. The ambushes and the difficulty and everything else. I simply understood it all. I got it. Is it a good game? Yes, absolutely. But there is a lot that needs to be slogged through before it really shows its true colors.

I don't have much to say about the other bosses. Most of them fell easily to my magic/bow combination. While some were designed exquisitely, very few actually stuck out to me. The Old Hero was a cool, albeit easy, concept. The Storm King was a cool boss fight once you get that awesome sword that's only really awesome in his arena. And the Old Monk was an interesting conceptual design that never worked for me.

The setting and level design in probably the high point of the game as well as the most memorable piece of it. The Tower of Latria's design in particular sticks out to me, being a prison and a collection of towers in this backdrop of a broken world. The settings almost feel like entirely different games put inside of one. None of them really look alike (besides the all-encompassing darkness present in one form or another in each every level. Other than that they do feel and play incredibly differently. The castle was neat with incredibly well-designed shortcuts and corridors. The tunnel felt far beneath the world and incredibly claustrophobic at times. The tower was both creepy and otherworldly, like something out of Lovecraft. The shrine was neat, a cliffside area that made me think of pictures of cool rocky coastlines. And the valley/swamp area was just terrible in every single way. The stories behind the areas were also interesting, although on a first playthrough I would be shocked if you even knew there was a story. I certainly didn't. I was just killing bosses and leveling up. Only after the endgame played out and I started new game+ did I finally stop and look some of the story and characters up, realizing that the game was much deeper than I had given it credit for.0

I talk about this game mostly as a game of visuals and fights because when I played it, that's exactly what I got out of it. While the lore is pretty solid, it's also fairly hidden unless you're willing to read literally everything, every description, every introduction, and, of course, reading into a lot of things too. I didn't do that when I played, opting to focus on the environments and getting better with the gameplay. Maybe it was my loss, although I enjoyed it as a game, and now I enjoy the lore as well.

As for everything else, let's see. I liked the Maiden in Black. Her design and character are incredibly interesting, verging on seriously awesome. I wish more characters would look and act like her. She's such an incredibly well-designed and thought-out central NPC. I can't really complain about her or the major merchants in the Nexus, (the central hub of the game). Oh, and I didn't even talk about how awesome the Nexus is, with its strange clockwork floor, changing music once you get late enough into the game and vertical levels.

The complaints I have are pretty small in general. The Valley of Defilement sucks to play. Some of the bosses are very easy. The early game really feels like it discourages new players. The lack of telling the player anything can be both incredibly rewarding and incredibly confusing. The world and character tendency things are literally incomprehensible for me. I have no idea what to do with any of that stuff and basically avoided it through lack of knowledge or understanding.

I will say that the dodge roll is my favorite feature in games though, and I wish it were in every game, because mastering a dodge roll is the only true way to play Demon's Souls.


Now, I do know that this game is not as played or as beloved as Dark Souls or other more well-known "hard games" out there, but it's also very good if it's given a chance. This game got me to try (and eventually fall in love with) the Dark Souls games, and its horrific atmosphere, gameplay that has to be mastered, and designs are something I will remember for many years to come. Compared to Dark Souls, I find Demon's Souls nearly its equal, with the only issues coming from lack of a "real/coherent" story and the ease of some of the boss fights if your character is built a certain way. But that's about it. When I get to reviewing Dark Souls, I'll talk more about comparisons and probably change my mind over which one I like more ten times over in the course of that review.

So, in summary, if you have a PS3 and like hard games, you should try this one out. I liked it a lot after the initial four years of annoyance and frustration. So... I think that's a recommendation? I give it a 'Salem's Lot out of Dracula.



Yeah.

Anyway, as some housekeeping for the blog, I'm back writing, as I mentioned last week. I'm probably going to be very inconsistent, really basing my writing and posting of reviews around when work and the fiancee aren't desperately seeking my time or attention. I'd love to say one review a week, but I doubt that pretty seriously. So, I won't say anything at all, and hopefully we'll all be surprised and shocked by whatever happens. I think I'm going to review a bunch of video games for a while, then some movies, and finally some books leading up to October, but anything could happen. And the October Nights 31 reviews will happen even if I have to never sleep. So no worries there.

Book Evaluation: De Vermis Mysteriis (????) by Ludwig Prinn

I found this book at my local book-sale last winter. It was an old tome, completely in Latin, or so I thought. before I had bought it, I flipped through it quickly, noticing words and phrases that I could identify with my own knowledge of Latin. The book itself is also in German as well, and there is some English, but it is incredibly hard to read, varying from full sentences written in incredibly broken English to sentences that have no relation to the English language at all except that they use English words.

While going through this book, reading and translating, I would often find myself with unbearable headaches that would last for hours at a time. Sometimes I would black out and have incredibly vivid nightmares of necromancy and forbidden magic. It appealed to me in some horrific way. The forbidden knowledge and arcane arts seemed to call to me from beyond some vast distance, across both time and space.

Soon, I had read the whole thing, or so I thought, but the next day, while hoping to look at a certain part again, I found new words and verses written on different pages. Notes and scribbles were now written in the margins, nonsense phrases full of maddening riddles that keep digging into my very mind as the world seems to crumble down around me.

The magic is the most important thing now. I must have Ludwig's greatest memory carry on. The dimensional horrors must be shown a way in. The Great Gods must be released upon society to bring enlightenment and fiery Hell upon all who deserve it. There are paths the words tell me to take.

The sentences make more sense now. They scream at me to let the Old Ones in. They scream at me and I have no way... no way to end that powerful shock to my mind. I hear it and I express regret. It has been too long. I have read too much. The Old Gods will come, and soon... soon... existence will come to an end.

How much longer can I wait?

The drums... I can hear them all whispering to me now... They speak of the eternity I will face... the eternity I will find if I do not allow them out. Why did I have to read that book? Why did I have to let it call out to me. forbidden knowledge should have remained that way... but now the sorcery runs rampant and I alone can start or stop them... Please, I need to know what... The Mysteries of the Worm. The worm... The great worn who awaits us all.

Tired now. Weak. taxing. It taxes me and I cannot...

I only want it away. Begone and it won't.

This book is disturbing and all I want... all I need... is to have never read it... but I have... I have and that's...

Book Evaluation: From a Buick 8 (2002) by Stephen King

From a Buick 8, an odd title and a play on the Bob Dylan song, "From a Buick 6" is Lovecraftian-styled horror novel by Stephen King. This novel has become one of my favorite Stephen King novels because of the attention to detail, the pacing of the plot, and the sheer terror in the details. This novel, right here, is the reason why horror is so addictive and so amazing. Anything can scare a person, even a car that serves as a portal to another dimension.

Oh yeah, that's the premise of this novel... and it is wonderful. This is not a so bad it's good novel. And it's certainly not a bad horror story. This is an incredibly well done story showing off the best of a novel that skips time, following a father and his son as they delve into the mysteries of a car that showed up one day and was never claimed. This novel is eerie in almost every way, reminding me of the Somerton Man, just as much as it reminds me of almost any real life mysteries. It almost seems as if it could be real and that's the really scary part.

The novel follows a police officer throughout his life as an officer until his eventual death. But he's not the protagonist. Instead his son, a helper at the police station, takes over that duty. Most of the story is told through flashback from one of several different police officers telling the intertwining story of the thing that resembles a 1953 Buick Roadmaster and his father, Curtis Wilcox.

The story is incredibly effective, blending both past and present into a coherent narrative. It becomes terrifying, not because of what actually happens within the story proper, but rather because of the implications of the story itself. The Buick is left at a gas station by a man in black who disappeared seemingly into nowhere. The Buick drew people towards it. It would make interference with electronic equipment. It would do such strange and inexplicable things, like making people disappear or giving off a terrible energy.

The Buick would both "eat" people and spit alien things out of it. And that's what the terrible implication is: there is a parallel universe, or at least that this "car" that could never run, could never even freaking drive and yet was driven to a gas station by some mysterious and disappeared man in black, is only a portal between two separate worlds that find the other terrifying and awful to behold.

The book ends as the Buick is losing power, finally spending any excess energy it has to try and take the heroes of the story into it as they try to destroy it. It fails even if Sandy Dearborn, the Sergeant of the police officers, sees through the portal one last time and "sees" the personal objects of those men who crossed the barrier between worlds.

This novel shares similar themes with two or three other Stephen King works and many, many Lovecraft works. The Mist and The Dark Tower series are the obvious candidates for being so similar to this book. The Mist is almost exactly like this novel, but on a larger scale, without a car, and with mist and monsters pouring out instead of being spit out or taken in from time to time. The Dark Tower series has many similar themes as well, especially in the last three novels of the series that explain "Todash" space and what lies within it. Actually many of Stephen King's more recent novels have built upon these similar themes, with Lisey's Story and Duma Key having some similar ideas and feelings to them. The other few books that have similarities are The Talisman, describing nightmare landscapes and a way to move between worlds, and N. that describes creatures from some other existence bent on the destruction of the universe if certain things are not done correctly. All in all, Stephen King likes the themes that are found in this novel and so do I.

This is a fantastic and horribly underrated novel. Few people know about Stephen King's amazing novels, knowing instead his weaker works like Carrie, The Shining, and Cujo. Those novels were all made into big movies (with a few other well known ones besides, deserving or undeserving), but even though they are known as Stephen King's REAL HORROR novels, they come off as shlock. They are earlier novels by him and do not stand up to the novels that he really takes seriously, like From a Buick 8 as a telling example.

This is an absolutely effective and terrifying novel that proves that pacing, plotting, characters, and atmosphere with an air of mystery and confusion can really lead itself to feelings of absolute horror. it may be subtle horror. It may be the horror of nothing, but, to me, it's the most effective kind of horror and the one that stays with me for months afterwards and still makes me shiver in the night.