Devil - Film Review

I watched a film last night and was pleasantly surprised to find it was dreadful.

My flatmate and I had carefully negotiated a movie we both liked the look of at a convenient time only to find it had been sold out. What do you do when you're with someone you don't know very well facing Saturday night together with nothing to do? You agree to watch a film in a hurry which you'd never normally consider and enter the screen with a sinking feeling.

In my case the film was Devil the latest story from M N Shyamalan although not written or directed by him this time. As Signs is one of my favourite films I suppose I was vaguely intrigued to see if he'd returned to form or still lost his way as with The Village (disappointing follow up to Signs). The problem is I don't do horror. Scary yes but gruesome no, murders aplenty not really, total gorefest no thank you, 18 rated not really my thing. So I really wasn't looking forward to a film that Cineworld 'Unlimited' magazine said to watch if you liked Paranormal Activity or Drag Me To Hell. I went in prepared to watch most of it through the cracks in my fingers.

I suppose the simple explanation is that Cineworld got it very wrong in its comparisons. That aside for a moment the film was disapppointing on a more generic level through being visually limited. Plenty of films have been set in one location - in this case an elevator- and still managed to look good (plenty of Hitchcock examples of Reservoir Dogs if that's your thing).

Also the lead characters lacked charisma, a sense of humour or anything that would make us really care about what happened to them. There was no love story, friendship or any relationship that was key to the narrative unfolding, in fact the most important relationship seemed to involve people who were already dead before the story began (maybe this is acceptable in a horror film - tell me if I'm showing my ignorance here).

However, ultimately despite not being a horror fan myself I think I know enough about the genre to declare this film a total failure on this issue alone - it just wasn't scary at all. Or grusome. To my great relief. The murders were all committed in the dark whenever the elevator lights failed. The restricted location made chase scenes, hidden killers or hiding victims impossible as well as alternative scary locations. And the ultimate reveal of the Devil is one of the most disappointing movie moments I've witnessed. Spoiler alert: When did you last watch a scary movie where the bad guy shrugged and said 'damn' before politely leaving the room and the victim alive?!

To add insult the final sequence looks like it's going to deliver a very obvious but much needed evil twist to the plot...well don't get your hopes up horror fans. In fact if you really appreciate a good horror flick do not watch this film. You will want your ticket money back, a refund on that expensive popcorn as well as an 'M Night' doll and some pins and you probably still won't be satisfied.

I wondered if Shyamalan was trying to undermine the horror genre but this is no take-off. He may have had another agenda, one revealed by the film's very last lines. This is an agenda I would normally applaud on a personal level but I'm not sure if this was the way for him to get his message across. He hasn't subverted the genre he's just made a bad film, never a good way to get people to listen to you.