Last issue’s column was a bit of a playful explanation of the column. This column, however, will be a return to the gritty details of horror for those who have been reading, and an introduction of horror’s gritty details for newer readers. The topic is the film Mirrors starring Kiefer Sutherland.
Let’s start off with something unconventional, a good opinion about this movie. A lot of people complained about the movie and said it was bad. This isn’t true. It has a great story. The presentation is perfect. The acting, which is usually a crime against cinematic nature in most horror movies coming out nowadays, is absolutely incredible. The topics that are delved into are ones that are have been troubling scientists, philosophers and religious clergy of any kind, since people started needing to explain the unknown (the nature of evil, the mind, death, the existence of any spiritual powers.)
OK. First thing you need is a good premise. Mirrors has that. The premise follows a fruitless search for truth in both reality and its spiritual reflection. It also follows the idea, through the spiritual reflection, that mirrors serve as two things. They serve as gateways between the material and spiritual world. They, through their reflective surfaces, also show a varying account of what truly is. Whether or not the reflected account is more real than reality is debatable, but that opens up a whole new can of worms that, with given word limits, would be impossible to truly cover in one school year of articles.
The story, up until the end, is actually incredible. The easy way to explain the story is this way: take 24, Candyman and Silent Hill, and mix them all together. Kiefer Sutherland plays a disgraced detective who was forced into temporary retirement after he killed an undercover police officer. He is thrust into an impossible situation. He has to break the law and his own moral code to potentially save himself, and his family, while he combats a malevolent entity that resides in reflective surfaces (mirrors, metal, windows, water, etc.,) but which is able to affect the world outside of mirrors. The sense of urgency, some of the action scenes and the ever-growing string of “damn it” are straight out of 24. It also doesn’t help that other than when Sutherland isn’t dressed in his security guard uniform, or the first time you see him in the film, he’s dressed in all the outfits he wore throughout the seasons of 24. The spirituality, obsession with mirrors and general abstract weirdness, are from Candyman, and to some extent, Silent Hill.
The presentation is completely unsettling with the occasional shock. Being that it is a movie that deals with two worlds, one on each side of a mirror, there are very few times you really know what side of the mirror you’re actually on. This is because perspectives are switched in ways where you could be watching the film from either side of a mirror. This builds up an intensely creepy atmosphere that is built up further by the soundtrack. The soundtrack is similar to what Philip Glass composed for Candyman. However, rather than focusing on just pianos, organs and voice, the focus is on strings (bass, cello, viola and violin) and voice. The result is creepier because it works well with the settings and pacing of the story.
Still, nothing is perfect. Then again, perfection is boring. The problem with the film is the end. Throughout, the film builds up to a big climatic moment. However, it manages to make the climax so big that it’s not only a little confusing on why it happens that way, but also makes it almost farcical. In other words, the climax turns into Jack Bauer vs. the devil. Then there’s the real ending because for some reason it had to follow Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, and have more than one working ending, and this doesn’t mean an alternate ending. The true ending of the film offers very little resolution. It doesn’t answer 75 percent of the questions brought up through the course of the film, and much like the ending of anything Silent Hill, it actually piles MORE questions onto the plate of the viewer. Still, this generally problematic ending somehow still fits in a way that works with the overall package. So that complaint is a minor one.
With the nature of this film, one of the questions that still remains is this: The devil and deception is in the details, and a mirror image through optical illusion is the opposite. So what’s in the mirror image of the details? Seriously though, it is a great movie, and worth the time to go see.