The Presence DVD Movie Review
The Presence DVD Movie Review
Directed by Tom Provost, starring Mira Sorvino, Justin Kirk, Shane West, Tony Curran
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This languid, slow-burn chiller will either have you running hot or left cold. Some may find it tedious, while others will appreciate the tension. Or, you might be like me: Tepid. I liked The Presence, didn't love it, yet recommend it.
The not-named characters include a man and a woman in love, and two ghosts at war. The four converge inside the walls of a lonely, woodsy cottage and while not everyone always knows what's going on, each of these creatures — corporeal and ectoplasmic alike — go through various trials of terror. The two most pitiful are "The Man" and "Ghost" (played respectively by Weeds' Justin Kirk, who was also so good in Four Boxes; and Shane West whom I don't recall seeing before, but reminded me a bit of Michael Shannon).
We first meet the gloomy, glowering Ghost, whose presence is felt right away. The beleaguered Man comes in about 30 minutes into the film. The Ghost is portrayed as a regular form, nothing decomposing nor devilish, and while he pretty much just broods around the cabin, there is something about his demeanor that's intriguing. He can't keep away from The Woman (Mira Sorvino), a scribe of some sort whose gone up to the old family homestead to clear her mind and get some important writing done. Ghost watches The Woman longingly as she goes about her day in (what she thinks to be) solitude.
Three is hardly company when The Man arrives on the scene to spend some time with The Woman, and the quiet intensity of the dynamic shifts into underlying, inexplicable fury. The game-changer and catalyst is another ghost, Black (Tony Curran), who is a true imp of the perverse. His presence corrupts The Woman, turning her against The Man. The Man is understandably confused, but after taking heaps of verbal abuse (too much, realistically), he decides to departed. The departed, meanwhile, stay on to wreak more havoc. There's a touch of romance, and a whiff of murder mystery as the crux is revealed.
I'm definitely making the movie seem more dynamic than it actually is; not much happens, and things are fairly glacial (thankfully so, when it comes to the camera work — the proclamation that The Presence is "brought to you by the producers of The Blair Witch Project!" had me a little worried at first, but the DP here knows what tripods, dollys and cranes are). The Presence is about mood, not monsters. While I could have done with a bit more suspense (ala Turn of the Screw, or The Sixth Sense), I can't fault the acting, the setting, or the editing. The inertia is probably due more to the deliberate direction (not bad at all, but not inspired in spite of a certain elegance) and the story line (another writer plagued with emotional trauma yet again retreating to a — what else? — remote cabin… really?)
If you're in the mood for something that unfurls unhurriedly, then by all means, check out The Presence. It's a good one for late-night, under the covers drifting-off.
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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson