Demonic (2015)

The film's premise is a straightforward concept that incorporates classic, overdone horror tropes with slices of Gen X flavor, in the form of found footage - as in documentary footage recovered from the scene. The dual concepts, although not original, are offered up in a clever parallel time line. It creates a sort of murder mystery aspect, broken up by standard paranormal horror moments next to found footage sequences. To a small degree the mixture sometimes feels disjointed, but the back and forth does break up any monotony that would otherwise be present.The cast give quality performances, the line up consists of recognizable faces, and known names. There is a glare of underdevelopment to the characters, that if a bit of tweaking had been done, could have really became full-bodied portrayals. Still there is enough to make them relatable. Special effects are the typical gimmicks one expects in these kind of films. Shock gags and sound bites meant to give a fright are over used and often fall flat. Still "Demonic" has its moments of genuine chills, and the gore elements are quality. Think "Insidious" -esque trickery, just a few more misses. The horror moments run the gambit of "see it coming" to "cool and creepy". Overall the film is a mediocre but watchable horror flick with some quality actors, refreshing concepts, entertaining climax, and enough death to hit that ghoulish spot. It does have some redundancy issues, and a cloud of "know what's going to happen before it happens", but the movie gives enough to make it enjoyable.

So, tonight, I decided to watch this movie thinking it was going to be another "Insidious" type movie with jump scares left and right. Boy, was I wrong. This movie is packed with suspense, relationships, scares, and jaw-dropping moments.For the first 30 minutes, I was getting a little bored, but I'm glad I stayed around. It really sets the story up for the last hour. **POSSIBLE SPOILERS** I am now going to submit my explanation for the ending. I am in no way a movie expert, so I can't say my explanation is wrong, nor right. So, if you've watched the movie, it's a no-brainer that the man the doctor was talking with wasn't John. It was the demon taking the form of John. When s**t hits the fan, and the circle is broken, I believe the demon possesses John's body. John then goes on a killing spree, killing everyone except Michelle, Brian, and...get this...Michelle's baby. John (the demon taking over John's body), cuts Brian's tongue out, but Brian is able to escape his grasp. Brian, to save his ex-girlfriend, that he was still in love with, taped her mouth shut, and put her in the secret room. Brian then escapes thru the milk shoot, steals a car to get away. The demon, without knowing where Michelle or Brian is, knows the only person in the house left to kill is John (the body it's taking over). The demon then makes John hang himself, then as the birds fly out of John's mouth, the birds (demon) takes the form as John's body, which the PI found. When the cops find Brian holding up the liquor store, Brian can't speak (his tongue is cut out). All Brian can do is yell. John (the demon in his body), hears Brian yelling, and then acts like Brian is the one doing all the damage, hence John's body being thrown around the room. The demon does this, knowing the officers will open fire, and boom!...that's another person down. The demon still knows Michelle and the baby has to die in order to be free. The demon hears that they found Michelle in the house. The demon then knows they are going to have to roll her over the seal, allowing the demon to possess either Michelle or the baby. When Michelle crosses the seal, and starts going into agonizing pain, that is when the demon is possessing the baby. Michelle then feels the baby kick, thinking it's healthy, until the last scene, when the baby does something weird. I believe the demon knows it must kill the baby and Michelle to be free...and that's where the movie ends.

The movie spends a ton of time with the police, processing the crime scene. It really kills the horror when the haunted house is full of cops. Without spoiling it, the twist seemed to be added last minute and doesn't work with the rest of the film. To me, it appeared the writer wanted a twist ending, but didn't know how to do it right, and it just comes off as a jumbled mess.

When I choose new Horror films to watch, I usually rely on IMDb posters and synopsis, followed by the video trailer (and sometimes based on proximity, in the list of "users also liked" found on pages of films I've enjoyed). So it was a very pleasant surprise for me to see the name James Wan (a.k.a the Wan and only!), master artist of modern Horror-Thriller, in the opening credits. With numerous triumphs to his name (Saw, Insidious, Dead Silence, and The Possession for instance), James Wan is to me no less than a brand name, guaranteeing top quality modern Horror mixed with suspense and just the right amount of drama. However, in this case - I must sadly say that the film didn't remotely resemble the level I've learnt to expect from Wan. Probably because he was a producer here, not in charge of story or direction.The first obvious characteristic made known is that it's somewhat of a combination between narration and found footage. A detective reaches a murder scene in a house infamous for similar murders 20 years ago, relating heavily to the occult. As the sole suspect is interrogated, he recaps the occurrences of the past few hours, or at least what he remembers. Simultaneously, the police technicians manage to salvage the footage of the cameras placed in the house, and together both testimonies slowly uncover the story. As a Horror fan who really doesn't like found-footage "mockumentaries" - I must say this combination was very well done!As for the acting, those of us who've seen Eurotrip were in for a nice little Easter egg, with Scott Mechlowicz playing the role of blunt antagonist Brian. After seeing him as the comic romantic, his skills in portraying the condescending patronizing ex-boyfriend were pleasantly surprising, the proof of acting talent! Other than that, I found the entire cast to be very good, with no-one standing out in particular.Now for the lesser parts... For starters, the story followed the all too familiar pattern of "youngsters performing seance, things go wrong, enter possession?". The exposition bringing said youngsters together and the overall conclusion of events were the only things resembling originality, with the conclusion part even less so as it's been done in other films. The build up lasts most of the film and does a good job in being compelling and creating suspense, but leads to an anticlimactic and somewhat disappointing ending. It feels like preparing the audience for a major twist, which turns out to be all too obvious and predictable (whenever the adjectives "anticlimactic", "obvious" and "predictable" are used to describe the twist and ending - disappointment is eminent).It's difficult for me to remain objective when the ending is a let down, but all in all I must say Demonic is quite a fun experience. I believe James Wan had no business participating in a mediocre production, but not all things mediocre are necessarily bad. I enjoyed the film pretty much until the ending, and I guess it's worth trying if you're a fan of this particular sub-genre.