By Zak Hudak
Sports Editor
You have to wonder if "Ouija" was produced with the specific aim of being characterized in whichever new (pre-) teen or horror movie spoof is inevitably made this year.
I, likely as a result of nostalgia for my "younger and more vulnerable years," really wanted to like this movie. I looked back at my memories of staying up past "lights-out" in a dark boarding school dorm room with a toy store-bought Ouija board and helping to convince our school's 300-pound football team center that the ghost of Joseph Stalin was after him. I was pretty sure that my old friend, now a starting Division I lineman, still slept with one eye open.
As far as I was concerned, the concept of this movie was brilliant. I couldn't believe it hadn't been made earlier. And perhaps it was the film's immature, recently-pubescent audience that caused this movie to be made the way in which it was.
The movie, and we will refer to "Ouija" as a movie, because to call it a film would dilute the film status of "The Shining" and other well-made horrors, begins with the beautiful, popular Debbie Galardi, who is naturally played by former Miss Teen USA Shelley Hennig, finding a "spirit board" in her attic. (Note: I'm not particularly concerned with spoiling the plot for my readers, as the trailer tells almost the entire story.)
Debbie is found dead, hanging from her entryway chandelier by a string of lights because, well, spirit boards make you do shit like that if you break their rules of play. Her equally attractive (and equally basic) best friend Laine (Afra Sophia Tully) finds the board in her room and figures, "Hey, Deb's other friends and I better mess with this. Maybe it will let us in on her inner troubles." Because, well, why not?
The screenwriters obviously wanted to make sure us viewers felt like we were part of the gang, and didn't want to give us omnipotence, so conveniently, Debbers videotaped herself talking about finding the board and then about her fears once she unleashed its wrath. One can only imagine that she did this to make sure she'd be able to show her future children what a cute, yet quirky child she had been. Lucky for us (or otherwise she and her friends may have had to reason out through their own dropping-like-flies), Laine finds said videos on a flash drive conveniently given to her by Debbie's mother.
The ultimate low point in the movie is a scene in which Lane's boyfriend, Trevor (Daren Kagasoff, "The Secret Life of the American Teenager") – a character who is obviously also being haunted by the board or the board's spirits or whatever – rides his bike into a dark tunnel for ... wait for it ... nothing to happen. I can only assume that this scene, given that the camera continuously cuts to close-up shots of his feet peddling and the bike's spokes spinning, was meant to be an unfulfilled tension-buildup to keep the viewer from guessing – and "knowing through the movie's utter predictability" is probably a better term – that something bad will happen before it does.
And that is the real problem with this movie. It would have been a perfectly fine low-budget ($5 million) horror film. That seems to be what producer Michael Bay had in mind when he cast a group of untalented kids who happened to have been popular in high school. But first-time director Stiles White, who was a production coordinator on films such as "The Sixth Sense" and "Jurassic Park III," seemed to have gotten a little too excited in his new position.
He, along with the consistently terrible Juliet Snowden, wrote the screenplay and simply tried for too much. The two left us with a script that tries too hard to sound natural and, when recited by a group of equally unimpressive "actors," comes out like slam poetry. Moreover, the juxtaposition of a horrible, gaping hole-filled packed plot, to relatively well-done special effects leaves the viewer confused about the set of movie "reality" rules to apply in this existential-crisis-of-a-movie.
The one saving grace of "Ouija" is when (ACTUAL SPOILER ALERT) Debbie's ghost appears at the perfect time to fend off evil spirits and to allow Laine to destroy the board. But hey, if we're going to have a cheesy cameo-to-life of Debbie, don't we want to hear a cheesy Steven Seagal-eqsue kill line? Come on, Stiles White.
If you want a scary movie with characters who make such obviously dumb decisions that you feel compelled to yell at them through the screen, "Ouija" could be your fix. The same goes if you enjoy pointing out obvious plot inconsistencies. Just be advised that this movie tried to be more than that. It will confuse you with its purpose to the point of annoyance and leave you wishing you went for an illegal streaming of "The Wicker Man."
– By Zak Hudak, Sports Editor
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