Mirror mirror on the wall

Film review: Oculus (15)
Running time 104 minutes
Rating:***
Those of us who are familiar with the ever-changing face of Doctor Who, which is, I think, the longest-running sci-based drama in the world, will be pleased to see that one of his innumerable glamorous assistants has made it onto the big screen.
Scottish-born redhead Karen Gillan, the more recent of the Doctor’s so-called ‘travel companions’ (no sniggers please) takes the starring role in Oculus, a psychological/ ghost drama based around the concept of a haunted mirror that has an insatiable hunger for souls.
Now this is a good idea, better than the idea of a haunted fridge in Ghostbusters, a haunted car in Christine, and a haunted doll in Chucky. It’s a meaty role, giving young Karen the chance for plenty of ‘ghost story-type acting’ plus a little ’is-she-just-a-lunatic- really?’ acting.
Written and directed by Mike Flanagan, who comes from Salem, Massachusetts , where they tend to know a bit about such things, Oculus is a relatively standard haunted-house-with-a-twist story, but which has solid narrative and good acting to back it up.
Karen plays Kaylie Russell, who with brother Tim (Brenton Thwaites), witnessed her father Alan (Rory Cochrane) go mad, and torture and murder his wife Marie (Katie Sackhoff). Mistakenly, the police believed that Tim had killed his father in revenge for the murder. The two siblings, who were there after all, know different.
After a decade in a mental hospital, Tim is released and joins his sister in going all out to destroy the real culprit – the mirror.
So, an elaborate plot develops in the film, recording all possible attempts to destroy the malignant force in the object which comes with flashbacks and hallucinations for the brother and sister, while the mirror goes all out to avoid destruction.
Frankly, given the circumstances, I would creep up on the thing with a lump of semtex, slap it on the back and count to three. But then, that would be a very short film and the script says 104 minutes.
And if you was tempted to be pedantic, some might take issue with the naming of the film since notable dictionaries describe an oculus as a roof opening in a building, designed to let light in, quite a different idea to a mirror with dark and evil designs.
Mind you, mirrors have an honourable place in horror, what with vampires not being seen in them, people stepping through them to another place and time, and the whole idea of a mirror as a crossing point between different realities – ’ looking through a mirror darkly’, or a so-called ‘event horizon’.
Oculus is a much more straightforward film however. There’s the required amount of blood, creepy looking people appearing and disappearing, and the claustrophobic atmosphere necessary for such things to be believed.
Oculus is still a worthy addition to the horror genre, and a great outing for the first-time director and a first-time star, and should do well at the box office. Good enough, one hopes, for lissom Karen to be offered more top roles.