The Apparition
The Apparition has had a long and troubled post-production history. The film has been sitting on the studio shelf for a good two years or so, being bumped about to different release dates over the years. During that time, the studio hacked and edited the movie to pieces in a failed effort to save what they knew was a doomed project. The end result of the studio hack job is something that will likely irritate and confuse audiences, instead of thrilling them. I'm not sure how much of the blame should be laid at the feet of the film's writer-director, Todd Lincoln, as I don't think what ended up on the screen was the movie he wanted to make. I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt, and say that the failure is the result of studio interference and a project that got out of control. This is his first time behind the camera, so I can only hope he uses this as a learning experience. And if he really was pleased with the final result, then I sincerely hope he regains his senses soon.
As the film opens, we see some grainy film footage of "The Charles Experiment", an attempt back in 1973 by some paranormal researchers to summon the spirit of a dead colleague. After that, the movie skips ahead sometime later to some college students trying to recreate the experiment. The group is led by a young man named Patrick (Tom Felton from the Harry Potter films). They do succeed at contacting "something" from the other side, but whatever it is, it's not happy, and ends up killing one of the students through a lot of noise and shaky camera work. We once again flash forward an unknown amount of time later, and find that one of the survivors of that college incident, Ben (Sebastian Stan), has moved on with his life, and is now living with his girlfriend Kelly (Ashley Greene from the Twilight films) in a home that belongs to her parents, which they are house-sitting while the parents are away.
Almost instantly, ominous signs that something is not right start popping up around the house. A fresh young plant that Kelly brings home instantly withers and dies as soon as she brings it into the house. Furniture starts moving on its own. A neighbor's dog who sneaks inside the house starts barking at nothing, then promptly lies down and dies. Large patches of mold starts growing in the corners of the ceiling. What does it all mean? Heck if this movie can give us any sort of clear answer. We know that whatever Ben and his friends back in college summoned during their experiment is now haunting him, but why exactly? Why is it picking on him, and why did it wait until now to start doing so? And why is it so drawn to Kelly, especially when she's in her underwear, or in the shower?
Due to the fact the film's been hacked and edited to pieces, we get a lot of stuff that just makes no sense at all. Patrick tells Ben that the evil spirit is haunting him, yet it seems to draw all of its attention at Kelly for some reason. We also get some kind of revelation that the spirit they called over is somehow attempting to take over the world, but it's never clearly explained how and why it's planning to do so. The Apparition is such a mess, I eventually stopped trying to follow it, and just waited for it to be over. Whatever ideas this film was trying to express at one time apparently wound up on the editing room floor. All that remains on the screen is a jumbled series of scenes that basically boil down to the young cast walking around dark halls, while loud noises bang away on the soundtrack.
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