The Possession Review

Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!

Plot Summary: A divorced father buys his daughter a mysterious box that contains a demon that seeks to possess her body.

Review: Here is yet another example of wasted potential combined with contrivances and cliches. My biggest problem with this film was probably its complete lack of originality. I think we know what to expect at this point: girl gets possessed slowly, starts to act weird, family and friends in denial, someone starts to suspect the supernatural, no one believes them until full blown possession, exorcisim is performed, film ends on happy note...oh wait, no it doesn't! Following this boring formula wouldn't even be too bad had it been done in a scary way or even with some cool twists or whatever. There were a few moments I really thought they were going to go in a different direction only to give me cliched material like how the parents are divorced in the most cliche manner, the daughter befriending the demon at first, throwaway victims to bolster the "tension" and pad the film, etc. The contrivances are annoying too such as the lone rabi that wants to help the father when no one else will. The other thing that kept bothering me were the hilarious moments when the movie thought it was being scary. For example, there would be shots of the possessed daughter standing with a supposedly creepy face; there was just something about the pose, the cornball nature of the scenes, and lame music playing that made me laugh each time it happened. There was a scene that was starting to feel original with some potential when the daughter was getting a MRI or something like that, but they wasted that with a crappy cgi demon face with the idiotic implication that the demon isn't just "in" her but literally inside her! The girl was also wearing this ring (to pathetically symbolize the possession to the audience as if we can't figure it out) in this machine which would have been a no-go in reality. They wrote out the mom's new boyfriend for no real reason; in fact, he is so pointless to the film I wonder if he was a character lost somewhere in script rewriters? The end is so stupid with that dumb Hollywood add on of a final shot to show it's not really over. Eh, this movie was typical mediocrity mostly due to some decent acting and a few interesting ideas depite being wasted. I would definitely pass on this one for now and watch something like the "Exorcist" in its place. I wasn't even expecting much and this film managed to let me down.

Notable Moment: When the possessed Em is running around in the morgue; there was a nice touch with the red lighting.

Final Rating: 5/10