I’ve definitely been able to keep the length of the movies down a bit compared to last week, which has helped, as this week has been quite busy. Today was my eleven-year anniversary so we went out to dinner, but I was able to get a movie in once we got home. After watching The Babadook last night I decided it was time to dive into It Follows, which has a 6.9 out of 10 star rating on IMDB and 97% on Rotten Tomatoes.
It Follows starts with the death of an unknown girl who initially is freaking out about nothing before finally driving away and waiting for something we will not see here. Then we meet Jay Height, played by Maika Monroe, who…um…has relations with her new boyfriend, Hugh, then fills her in that it will come for her and she has to run. It appears as a naked woman who is slowly shambling towards them, and the chase begins. Hugh, played by Jake Weary, establishes the rules and Jay is then unsure what to believe. It’s not long before “it” proves to be real and Jay and her friends take off to escape.
The film is full of jump scares, and I won’t lie that a few got me. The music is heavy synth oriented and it seemed to be a bit too excessive, but that could be the result of watching it with my stereo-gaming headphones. The atmosphere of the film seems to try and disarm the characters and the audience to help establish a sense of security to really help the jump scares land. Overall the film wasn’t bad, but it did seem to serve it’s purpose more so than tell a compelling story or build interesting characters that I can feel sympathetic to their plight. It is interestingly ambiguous as to what year the film is set. The TVs are older, but one character has a flip phone that appears to be a touch screen. The clothes vary in style quite a bit.
Ultimately, the film is trying to establish itself as a parable for sexually transmitted diseases. You have sex with a person who passes “it” on to you. The only thing you can do is wait to die or pass “it” on to someone else. It’s not exact, but it works for the most part and is clear as a metaphor. It’s reminiscent of 80’s slasher flicks where the lesson seemed to be “if you have sex you will be killed by a guy in a mask,” which clearly hoped to scare teens out of pre-marital sex. The lesson isn’t quite as extreme in this film, however, as it seems to imply if you have pre-marital sex you may die, unless you can have sex with someone else who will then have to deal with it.
The movie wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t really that great either. Again, I don’t feel that story is all that compelling nor is the lesson clear. If you’re looking for a quick film that may make you jump once or twice and not be boring this might be the one for you. I give It Follows 5 out of 10 stars.
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