The Gist
When a family moves into an old home their teenage daughter claims they are being watched. Is it supernatural or something more sinister though.
The Review
When it comes to cinema there is nothing that filmmaker Steven Soderbergh has tackled over the years. From big Hollywood franchises like Magic Mike and Oceans through to alternative films like Sex, Lies & Videotape and the very under-rated Haywire.
Soderbergh has also been a director who has been willing to take some big chances with his films over the years as well. With The Girlfriend Experience he cast porn actress Sasha Grey to be his leading lady while Contagion eerily predicted a future world event.
With his latest film, Presence, Soderbergh returns to his experimental roots by asking the question what happens in the horror/thriller genre when the audience themselves experiences the mystery from the perspective of the ‘horror’ itself.
The presence watches as a family moves into its home and before it even makes itself known this is already a family already in distress. The marriage itself is strained as Chris (Chris Sullivan – Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol 2) suspects that his, Rebekah (Lucy Liu – Charlie’s Angels), is stealing from her employer and he doesn’t like the fact that it could cause problems for their family.
Meanwhile their teenage daughter, Chloe (Callina Liang – Bad Genius), is going through hell after the mysterious death of her best friend. Then there is their frustrated son, Tyler (newcomer Eddy Maday) who is annoyed at his sister’s melancholy and is feeling the pressure of being part of the High School Sport’s program. The only thing that seems to be going right for him is that he seems to have made friends with one of the school’s most popular students, Ryan (West Mullholland – Dark Harvest).
It doesn’t take a long after the family moves in for a bond to develop between the presence and Chloe and it seems like the presence is not happy with Tyler’s hostility towards her nor her budding relationship with Ryan.
Soderbergh’s idea here is a stroke of genius and it is one so easy to bring to the screen that you can only wonder why other filmmakers haven’t though of it easlier. He doesn’t use any over-the top CGI or special effects he literally presents the image to the audience in the way a presence would see things. Long scenes with one camera shot that follows whatever the presence is looking at at that moment.
The only disadvantage that the audience may experience is the fact that Soderbergh is so determined to make the experience feel natural that there are times when a character might be slightly out of earshot, if the presence is watching them a window etc, so the audio design turns down the conversation to a muffled low level. That kind of creates havoc for you if you are a little hard of hearing.
That leads me to another important point about this film – as an audience you need to be paying attention all throughout the film. Soderbergh is not the kind of filmmaker that sets out to make things obvious to the viewer – he is banking on you listening to every word of the dialogue and watching everything he frames in each shot in order for you to be able to follow key points of the plot.
As far as the plot goes this is a film that does work. There is suspense throughout the film not only from what the presence is going to do itself but also whether or not this family is going to implode or not. Add just a hint of a murder mystery in there and once again we see Soderbergh return to his suspenseful best – aided a lot by the work of screenwriter David Koepp (Jurassic Park).
The natural look to this film also puts a lot of pressure on the actors – not that you can tell from their performances. Chris Sullivan is remarkable throughout the film and he is well supported by Lucy Liu who reminds Hollywood that she is a gifted dramatic actress when you move her away from the action genre.
The real highlight here though are the performances of the teenagers. In a lot of ways Callina Liang carries this film and she is sensational in every scene. From drama through to suspense she grounds this film and adds to its realism. Eddy Maday also puts in one of the best newcomer performances that we have seen for a long, long time while West Mullholland puts his character through a range of emotions – all of which makes him seem to be an actor that we should be looking out for the future.
The Verdict
Prescence is a stark reminder that there are filmmakers out there who are still willing to experiment within the horror/suspense genre. It is a slow-burn watch but one that you will enjoy if you like your films on the alternative side. This is one experiment that certainly comes from a fulfilling new formula.
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