Official Synopsis
When frightening events start to occur in their home, young couple Kelly (Ashley Greene) and Ben (Sebastian Stan) discover they are being haunted by a presence that was accidentally conjured during a university parapsychology experiment. The horrifying apparition feeds on their fear and torments them no matter where they try to run. Their last hope is an expert in the supernatural, Patrick (Tom Felton), but even with his help they may already be too late to save themselves from this terrifying force.
I’ll be honest, I had to watch this movie three times to get what the heck was happening.
It all starts off well, as we have a team of young scientist, led by Tom Felton’s Patrick, trying to conjure up a being that doesn’t really exist. Based on a 70s experiment, the team opens up a doorway and conjures up ‘something’ that is pretty pissed. Somehow this thing makes its way to the home of Ben and Kelly, and begins to terrorize the hell out of them. From strange growing mold-like things that contain bones in the kitchen to scratched up closets; this thing wants to hurt Ben and Kelly in the worst of ways.
Now, before I go any further, my first question is this — how in the heck did this thing make it to this couple’s house? I haven’t really found the answer to that question. I guess that Patrick could have brought it to them, although Patrick doesn’t show up until this thing is already firmly established in the home. Also, even if he did bring it with him, it still doesn’t make sense on why it wanted to stay. By the end of the film, when a large explanation is presented, then it makes sense, but prior to that moment the story is enormously confusing, with plenty of holes to boot.
I digress, getting back to the story, Kelly and Ben have their relationship hurt thanks to this nasty intruder. Kelly wants to leave, Ben wants to figure things out and stay, so they compromise (sorta) to give it one last go. Patrick (Tom Felton) is brought into the scene and they attempt to do a ‘reverse’ conjuring. Needless to say, once the door is open it is damn near impossible to close it. So, without ruining the ending, I can tell you things don’t go quite as planned.
In the long run, I adore the idea of something being conjured and something wanting to hunt people down, but it has to be sensibly done. The story, at best, is pretty darn messy. There are more loopholes on ‘how’, ‘why’ and ‘where’ then the film can explain. The moments of uneasiness are pretty spectacular, but they’re clouded by the feeling of uncertainty on how the story got this point. It is as if they wanted to make this wonderfully scary moments in a movie, but had a hard time connecting the dots to get their smoothly. Sure, it’s completely okay to that there may not be any explanation for the happenings, but there is in this case. There just isn’t enough detail of how they all came to be.
Anyway, The Apparition isn’t the worst ghost film that I’ve seen, but it’s certainly not the best. I’m still voting for the Paranormal Activity series, as well as a few there films to best this one. Horror fans might appreciate it, though, so don’t count out The Apparition until you’ve seen it.
As for the Blu-ray side of things, the high-quality HD that Warner Home Video delivers makes this portion of the film pretty impressive. The visual effects in The Apparition are done well, so it doesn’t look like crap when it’s transferred to HD. The better the effects, especially for horror, the more frightening the horror film is going to be. It adds value to it all, so this is a huge plus for this particular movie. As for the color balance and compression, you get no banding whatsoever with the shots. There is little to no grain, which again makes for a more intense horror film. What I found particularly fascinating about this release is how the movie starts to degrade and become void of color as the horror intensifies. I really enjoyed that progression.
Finally, as for the features on this release, here’s what to expect:
– The Dark Realm of Paranormal
– Haunted Asheville
– The Experiment of the Apparition
– The Apparition: A cinematic Specter
Three out of the four special features are way too much about Joshua P. Warren and not enough about the production itself. I think the paranormal material is interesting, but I would rather have more interviews with actors/actresses, director, producer and more about what they were trying to shoot for with the film. There just isn’t enough of that. I want to go back, I have nothing against Joshua P. Warren, but he just isn’t as exciting after the third featurette as a ‘making of’ feature. Commentary would have been nice as well. What you get here is just some information about the paranormal aspects of the story and an explanation about what antagonist they were trying to create. Nothing wrong with that, just not as exciting as it could have been.