Some of the best scares come surprisingly early on, in the scenes where Sandberg allows time to let the tension build before throwing you right into the scare. By the end, I was amazed by all the different ways that Sandberg played with light and dark, especially in places you wouldn’t immediately expect. The highlight of this movie was by far its abundant and effective scares. This history leads to a truly creepy scene where the mother well-meaningly attempts to ‘introduce’ her son to her otherworldly friend. Said backstory is still a little cliché however, and something that the movie almost could have done without, though it does underline Sophie’s connection with Diana. Thankfully it doesn’t lean on the horror genre’s habit of throwing all the exposition in the last five minutes of the film.
On the more refreshing side, Rebecca discovers the truth behind Diana surprisingly early on in the film. You’d think that out of every horror movie that fails this trope, this would be the one where the characters would really want to make sure that every light was on. While Rebecca finds numerous table lamps with bulbs taken out and cords cut, none of them seem to try the wall switches even once.
One whole scene of the film has Martin, Rebecca and her boyfriend Bret exploring the darkened house for information. Instead, they’re at the mercy of their mother and her ‘friend’, Diana.Īside from this twist on the usual cliché, Lights Out does play into a lot of common horror tropes. The film even goes so far as to have a character lay out the mother’s legal rights as Martin’s guardian, telling Rebecca that she can’t just take him away from a supposedly imaginary danger. It places a certain amount of vulnerability on her children. This element is interesting for a horror movie - usually children are the ones with the demonic invisible friend, but this time the mother is the one who has bonded with a dark power and generally can’t be trusted. It doesn’t waste time with false alarms, skepticism and disbelief - the moment Martin tells his big sister about his mum’s ‘friend’, she takes action. This is likely one of the factors that makes it work in all the places it shouldn’t have. With a lean hour and twenty minutes to work with, Lights Out doesn’t mess around. However as she reconnects with her estranged family after being called into her brother’s school to pick him up when their mother can’t be contacted, Rebecca starts to come into her own. It’s pushed further by the design of her apartment - liberally sprinkled with death metal posters and bongs. Rebecca’s characterisation is a little forced early on, shoved in your face by a scene in which she asserts her independence by telling her well-meaning not-quite-boyfriend Bret that he isn’t allowed to stay the night. You really don’t have to wonder too long about why that’s there. The dingy living space sits above a tattoo parlour, lit by a giant neon sign that buzzes on and off through the night. We also meet her rebellious daughter Rebecca, now living away from her mother in a small apartment. We meet a family broken by the disappearance of one father, the death of another and the mental illness of Sophie, a single mother left behind to raise her young son Martin. This begins in the very first scene, where the warehouse’s downlights create little islands of light that provide safety from the creature that lurks in the dark.Īfter a good few minutes of seeing the evil spirit in action, Lights Out jumps right into its main character setup. Light is used creatively throughout the entirety of the film, keeping the concept mostly fresh. For those who somehow haven’t seen the original short, you can watch it, and Lotta, here:Īlthough this early scene is a close recreation of the original short, or at least the first part of it, the familiarity ends there. She plays a very familiar role for fans of the first film - indeed, it is her fingers on the light switch that introduce the light-fearing monster at the centre of Lights Out. An unknown being stalks a man working late in a creepy warehouse filled with mannequins, presumably because mannequins are spooky.Įarly on we get a cameo from Lotta Losten, Sandberg’s wife and the actor in the original short film. It begins with a fast-paced, nail-biting introduction to the threat. Lights Out was brought to the big screen with the help of James Wan, and those familiar with Wan’s work will see a similar style in first-time director David Sandberg’s film.
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