Lights Out - C+

Quick Hit: Sufficiently creepy at times, the movie gets bogged down in its exposition heavy backstory.

​Lights Out is the newest movie for horror movie month. It’s not bad – at times it is actually pretty good (if good means scaring you legitimately that is). However, it’s not all good, so I actually have quite a bit to say about it (I know what you’re thinking, surprise surprise).

Lights Out follows a girl of undetermined age (probably roughly in the age 21 bracket – though she could be much younger) as she tries to help her brother escape from the clutches of a 

monster that has attached itself to her mother. This sounds a bit to me like it could be a sequel to 2015’s excellent horror film The Babadook (I want credit if Hollywood takes that idea), and there are quite a few similarities. The mother has obvious depression and psychological issues. The young boy can be sweet at times, but he can also be annoying as all get out. The movie makes it seem like the mother can just take a pill and make all her problems go away. This makes a disease into a convenient plot point, and that’s a shame. Overall, the mother’s issues do tie into the monster’s backstory, which makes everything feel a bit more compelling than what we normally see in a horror film. I don’t really like what it says about mental illness though.

However, the way that the majority of it is delivered is full of expository nonsense. I feel like it would have been much better if things were delivered in a manner that was more visual. I know that there were parts of it that were full of flashback type things, but the way it was given felt lazy to me. That may just be my interpretation of it, but there it is.

The monster (Diana) was pretty well-done. I think her backstory itself was worthwhile, and her motivations were solid. I was a bit confused about the way her powers manifested, and exactly how she got around. That seemed a bit rushed in the movie as it was trying to establish things quickly and get to the action. She was incredibly terrifying though. There are few things that play on man’s primal fears like the dark. It’s something that is innate within us from an extremely young age. Most small children go through a bout where they are afraid of the dark; I was no different. Therefore, there were scenes where the lights flickered and the scene went dark that caused my heart to stop and flutter.

One question that I had throughout – how was she consistently turning off the lights? It makes the movie seem a bit too contrived – why doesn’t she just off all the lights… every time?

​I know that’s a bit nitpicky, but hey, I’m reviewing movies.

Another side note while I’m going one sentence paragraphs – I was sad to see Billy Burke mostly wasted in his role. He’s too good for quick roles.

My final thing that I wasn’t super fond of was the fact that blacklight scene. It was pretty interesting if you think about the science behind it… but it was dumb. We didn’t need to see her. That’s the whole point! I liked the dark shadow version. And she looked like a retread of another James Wan film – the original demon woman from The Conjuring.

I mean seriously.. that may be the same prosthetics.

So, despite having such high intentions when I started writing this review, I’m going to give Lights Out a “C+”.

Thanks for reading!

For more on this film, check out IMDB.