It Follows - 2014
What’s the oldest horror trope in the book? Anyone? How ‘bout this…every horror movie begins with two (generally white) people having sex? Or, its corollary: Whenever two people do the horizontal polka, they aren’t gonna be around too much longer. Well, in true tongue-in-cheek fashion, David Robert Mitchell begins It Follows with this premise and expands it into one of the more genuinely freaky flicks in years.
The story begins with – you guessed it – our darling protagonist having a good time with a guy in the backseat of his car. Afterwards, instead of being offed, she’s told that she will be followed by a presence determined to kill her. From there, the film takes off like a Lear jet. Let’s relish in the details for a moment. The film is shot using this very unique, menacing dark and blue photography. Moreover, any truly great horror thriller has a dynamite score, and this one is no exception. To this end, Mitchell enlisted a 28 year-old named Rich Vreeland, who goes by the name of Disasterpeace, to craft a “bold, electronic score.”
Disasterpeace. Sounds pretty BA, right? Uh huh. Whitest. Dude. Ever. I mean, this cat is like one of Zuckerberg’s classmates at Harvard. Maximalist nerd, minimalist score? Who really knows, but he did previous score work on video games, and everything he does here is frankly chilling.
Let’s be honest for a second. I’m a major scaredy-cat when it comes to these kinds of tales. I almost want to fast forward through the night time scenes to get a reprieve. But, It Followsoffers us no such solace. With the shooting and score, I was genuinely creeped out during the broad daylight sequences! I can’t remember the last time that’s happened.
See, if you want to craft the perfect villain, make it ubiquitous and faceless. Make it everyone and no one at the same time. That’s the “it” in this movie. Any person can walk into the scene at any time and start pursuing whoever it’s after. And, the film is a total homage to Carpenter’s Halloween flicks. The nameless faces are never in a hurry. They just saunter along towards their destination. No matter how fast the victims run, they’re always caught! Usually you just have to buy this as one of the preposterous aspects of horror movies. Here, there’s a (quasi?) logical out, namely that the next person in the victim’s vicinity can pick up the chase at any time.
Finally, two more quick things. First, I just love the fact that the only way one can escape the terror is to “pass it on,” aka sleep with someone else and make them the new target. This is just brilliant stuff here. Think about it. The villain is an STD monster! The movie is brimming with dark humor anyway, but this subtle commentary on the dangers of irresponsible sexual expression “takes the cake”!
Additionally, there’s nary any blood to be found anywhere! This is like full-on anti-Eli Roth type material. The scares are in the pursuers, the unending sense of dread, and inescapable feeling of doom. In the end, It Follows is just an old-fashioned spookfest that forces us to face the age-old inevitability of death, while introducing a new element of terror: Where do we go when we can literally see it coming?
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