“Presence” opens on an old house with a new face. A posh, american dream complete with two stories, a spacious porch, and fresh coat of cobalt. The camera floats to the front door, before weightlessly gliding through the entryway, along the notably expansive kitchen and dining room, across the living room, and up a switchback staircase. We are then perfectly positioned to view into the home’s three bedrooms before finally finding shelter in a closet. Through this cold open, director Steven Soderbergh brilliantly displays that the camera isn’t here just to present a presence to an audience, but that we are the presence. However, “Presence” proves that cinematography dripping with nuance doesn’t necessarily translate to a successful end product, as this ghost story is loaded with dry storytelling.
Immediately following is a subtle, chuckle-inducing realtor (Julia Fox) presents the house to a family of four — Rebecca, Chris, Chloe, and Tyler — looking for a new home. After a brief financial back and forth between the realtor and Rebecca (Lucy Liu), the screen cuts to black. What seemed to be an original exclamation underlining the story’s true inauguration, soon becomes an immersion-shattering annoyance regularly occurring and butting between scenes.
Throughout the film we start to understand these characters, in little capacity. Rebecca and Chris (Chris Sullivan), are on the brink of divorce for reasons pushed in our face and down our throat: Rebecca’s workaholism is formulaically presented through her constant phone usage. Her preference of Tyler (Eddy Maday) over Chloe (Callina Liang) seems to exist solely because Chloe… suffers from anxiety? And rathers her son, shown only through a pushing incestuous scene of praise and between the two. Chris’ character was written just to be an ally to Chloe, leaving no room for any personal characteristics and growth.
Tyler and Chloe have a cliché head-butting relationship taken to the extreme. Tyler is — again — a cliché high school blockhead with little compassion for his sister or others, going off on her for being sad that two of her friends had died from “accidental overdoses”. As far as Chloe goes…is not very far. Her character is also extremely underwritten for all we really know about her is that she’s depressed (which sure, pity her for that), but other that we don’t get any insight into who she is.
The last character in this uninspired tale is Ryan (West Mulholland) who becomes a quick idol for Tyler and love interest for Chloe after he meets them with a simple “Sup”. One of “Presence’s” rare positives is Ryan’s dialogue with the siblings: never has a movie nailed the lazy and fake confidence of an illusive high schooler like this one.
As the family gets more adjusted to the home, and as Ryan becomes closer with Chloe, the ghost makes itself known to her. It tidies up her notebooks and breaks her cabinet, stopping her and Ryan’s sexcapades in their tracks. At least we know this is a ghost with good old fashioned christian values! After telling her family about the presence, of course papa bear Chris is the only one who even slightly believes her, and her brother, in an unrealistically forced performance, lashes out, saying. Being the caring father he is, Chris gets in touch with a medium who, upon arrival, says the ghost is connected to Chloe through her anxiety…kind of. It’s not really explained in full, and seems more like uncomputable ghost hunter talk that will certainly not be explained further.
After a larger fight between the family, the ghost rushes upstairs to ransack Chloe’s room, which the family witnesses and feels necessary to do something with the force within the house….. by doing nothing.
The movie ends quite abruptly with Ryan, after the parents leave for a weekend, roofieing Tyler, to then roofie Chloe to kill her as he “killed the others”. A totally unexpected twist yet hollow in expectation. While Ryan is putting thin plastic wrap over Chloe’s mouth and nose, the presence is able to wake up Tyler with a tremulous unknown force. This is pursued with him tackling Ryan out of the second story window, with both boys falling to their deaths. Another hard cut to black is followed up with Rebecca seeing her dead son in a mirror as the family is moving out. Cut to credits.
This movie takes an honorably big swing with its cinematography which, fundamentally, does its job. It’s fresh to see a ghost movie fully through the eyes of the ghost, even if the story is tragically lackluster. But the flavorless overacting of Liu and Maday along with the overly liminal score accompanied by long blackouts takes the viewer completely out of the story, leaving a desire for more to chew on. Similarly to “A Ghost Story,” this is not a horror movie, it’s a straight up drama with supernatural elements. Not so similarly, “A Ghost Story” has fat to chew on. If “Presence” had branded itself as what it really was, it would have made for a more enjoyable moviegoing experience, instead of trying to be an on-the-edge-of-your-seat type of fear fest. It’s one of those disappointing cases of a novel idea executed poorly.
