"It's Pretty Good"

Rating: 6/10 (21 August 2016)

"It Follows," directed by David Robert Mitchell, (who from his IMDb picture looks like he should be a character in his own movie, but I guess that makes sense) starts out as having no purpose other than paying tribute to the original "Halloween," from the seemingly self-composed synth-keyboard soundtrack (which I realized can be injected into any movie to instantly create an "80s throwback") right down to the "Laurie Strode" AKA "Jay Heights'" gaze through the high school class window while the teacher prattles on about a passage from Keats that can loosely be applied to the theme of the movie. Thankfully what "follows" is actually pretty thought provoking though at times for the sake of the story.
The premise of the movie is this: there is, let's call it an "affliction," that can be passed from person to person. How is this "affliction" passed, you might ask? Well, you have to have sex to get rid of it. What is the "affliction?" No matter where you are, someone will steadily be walking towards you to kill you.
Now, reading this description makes the symbolism of the movie only slightly more apparent than actually viewing it. Still, it's an interesting idea, and "It Follows" takes it pretty far. What could have been a run-of-the-mill "startle-fest" became one of the first modern horror movies with substance (there have only been maybe, five, in the past twenty years, though I await dispute on that). It's really a shame that the director felt it necessary to include scenes more fit for the cerebrally desert cash-grabs aforementioned than digging further into his own style for the scary stuff. That could have been really good.
I think the main issue with "It Follows" is that it puts the idea before the enjoyment of the viewer. Philosophically I can't completely disagree with this, I'm actually surprised that a movie like this reached mainstream markets in the era of multi-billion dollar raising superhero movies. It's just that right when it gets good, it seems to sell out with the (for lack of a better term), "paranormal activity" scenes.
The vigilant viewer will notice the antagonist is not the "sex zombies" (i.e. rape victims) but actually the attractive bad-boy friend (a friend that is a boy) of the main character who uses her vulnerability of needing to rid herself of her affliction as an excuse to score, despite the fact that he doesn't even believe her up to that point.
This is one of those movies that you probably need to watch more than once or twice to really appreciate. On it's face, it's obvious what the message is. Seeing the way Mitchell takes the premise further and further into the maze it what's really interesting to see and think about after.