It Follows
Horror is defined by the capability of protagonists to fight against the darkness that’s trying to destroy them. If a grotesque beast rears up against our heroes but they can fight back with guns and explosions, then we, the audience, lose some of that fear. We know that, no matter how strong the creature is, it can be weakened or destroyed.
True abject horror comes when something can’t be stopped, when nothing anyone does can halt it from coming straight toward its prey. That’s the sense of dread that makes David Robert Mitchell’s sophomore film, It Follows, a new indie horror classic.
It Follows tells the story of Jay (Maika Monroe, The Guest), a 19-year-old girl relentlessly followed by a shape-shifting creature after she has sex with her new boyfriend, Hugh (Jake Weary, Pretty Little Liars). The monster can’t be seen by anyone else, and it’s constantly following her at a shambling walk. It won’t run. It won’t make noise. But if it gets to her, she’s gone.
The film rises above other standard horror fare by its portrayal of Jay and her friends as likable kids acting as most people would in these situations. They question the parameters of the monster’s abilities, they don’t make many stupid horror-movie mistakes, and most of all, they’re not just fodder for the monster to slaughter. The audience grows attached to these characters, making every appearance of the monster that much more horrific. These aren’t blank ciphers or terrible people we know will die. In a sense, It Follows is more along the lines of a teen adventure movie … But is it scary? Will those viewers who crave the mounting terror and bursts of panic inherent in horror films find what they’re looking for? Oh, yes.
Horror films need time to breathe, to let the audience know that, for a short while, its protagonists are safe. It Follows understands this rhythm and lets the audience get to know the characters in several poignant moments to illustrate that these kids are regular teenagers caught up in something far beyond themselves. Yet it succeeds as a horror film precisely because all of these moments are stained by the knowledge that, not so far away, something is shambling ever closer, unbeknownst to nearly everyone it passes. Jay can never be safe from it, can never rest easy, can never keep herself from looking backward out the window, from seeing each and every unknown figure as her own potential death.
Cinematographer Mike Gioulakis excels at capturing this rising sense of paranoia, sending the camera in slow 360-degree pans, either following something terrifying and strange or mimicking the sense of anxiously scanning the crowd for danger. There are even scenes without the overt presence of the monster where you can see, way in the background, someone walking ever closer. Is it the monster or just a person? One scene in particular features the monster slowly stumbling across a college campus, viewed through a window — with each successful camera rotation, it’s closer and closer.
That other essential element of mounting horror — a good score — compounds the film’s excellence. The now-usual low drones give normally comforting scenes of swimming in a backyard pool or going on a date nearly unbearable levels of tension, while a percussive and synth-heavy score gives greater emotional weight to the real confrontations with the nameless creature.
Calling It Follows an allegory for STIs has some merit, but it’s also lazy. It’s not trying to punish or scare its characters (and therefore the audience) away from sex. It’s after something more. Calling the film a meditation on the death of childhood and innocence might be closer to the mark, yet even that doesn’t seem to capture everything bubbling under the surface of this film. Perhaps it’s casting its reach wider — trying to encompass anxiety and fear, that nagging little voice in the back of your head that always says something is wrong, that something awful is coming not so far in the future, no matter how good things are at the moment. Maybe it’s all of these things.
At its core, It Follows is a well-crafted and terrifying entry into the horror film canon. It can be enjoyed purely on that level, but it dips its toes into ideas beyond the realm of the usual slasher or monster film. Like the best movies, It Follows lingers after the credits roll, hiding somewhere in the recesses of the brain, turning every stranger into something fouler and every dark corner into a home for some unknown menace, waiting to lurch out, eyes locked on yours.
