Review #186: It Follows (2014)

This review was originally written in 2022.

Gabe's 100 Bucket List Horror Films Review #41: It Follows (2014)

I'll always go to bat for a film shot and set in Detroit, first because I grew up here, and second because I think the city has way more character and soul than people give it credit for. (Also, it's not 100% abandoned buildings and murder, though there is some of that too.) When I first saw this film back when it came out, I can't remember if I went in knowing it was shot in Detroit, but one of the first scenes takes place in the historic and iconic Redford Theater, which was just a few blocks from my childhood home (and it was where Sam Raimi hired ambulances to wait outside during the red-carpet premiere of The Evil Dead). It brought me so much joy to see a place I've been numerous times on the silver screen!

Anyway, about the movie.

While I don't think I'll be giving this one a 10/10, I really, really like this film. For anyone not familiar, it follows (no pun intended) Jay, a college-aged girl who contracts what can only be described as a "sexually-transmitted curse"; that is, after a one-night stand with a guy she's been seeing, she now has some kind of a shapeshifting, supernatural entity following her, walking in her direction unceasingly until it catches her. If it catches her, she'll die. If she sleeps with someone else, the entity will follow them instead, unless they pass it on to someone else. If the entity kills someone, it returns to following the previous person, and so on. So over the course of the film Jay and her friends (none of whom can see it, unless they're cursed as well) try to get her to safety, find out what they can about it, and hope they can come up with a plan to stop it.

I think the characters are all realistic and believable, and the plot alone is compelling and creepy and mysterious. This film isn't the scariest thing in the world, but there's plenty of tension, and even a few jump scares (one in particular involving a very large man happens early on and I hear people reference it all the time because it's really, really good). But what makes me really, truly love this film is how it plays with YOU (the audience).

See, the entity looks like a different person every time we see it. Sometimes these people are in some state of undress (which has caused some viewers to think that it's intended for them to be the forms of previous victims perhaps, though that doesn't always hold up), but most of the time they just look like normal people. However, the entity is always walking towards the current holder of the curse (usually, towards the camera). So in many scenes, you'll see a person in the background, walking straight towards you. Is it the entity? Sometimes. Sometimes it's just a person. Most of the time you can't be sure. But although this is something that affects the characters (oftentimes Jay or someone else cursed will see a person walking in the distance and freak out), it affects YOU too. I found myself ALWAYS looking at the background, scanning for anyone who might be the entity. I was always on edge. And I'm 100% sure this was intended by the filmmakers. The fact that this uncertainty and implacable fear of the unknown can be passed on to the viewing audience, strikes me as something truly special.

The film isn't perfect; some parts of it are a bit dry, the era it's set it in is intentionally vague (characters watch black-and-white CRT televisions while reading ebooks on their beyond-modern clamshell pocket computers) which is cool sometimes but doesn't always serve a purpose, and the characters' eventual plan to defeat the entity is really kind of stupid. But all in all, this movie just has such a good vibe to it, it's a fun time, and it managed to get inside my head in a way other movies simply couldn't.

Overall Rating: 9/10 Wet Casts

Filming Locations: While watching an early scene, I noticed a street sign in the protagonist's neighborhood. I decided to google it and see where it was- I knew it was in or around Detroit, but when I looked at the map and zoomed out a tiny bit, I realized it was ACROSS THE STREET FROM MY WORK. Needless to say, I drove by and got a picture on the way in today.