PRESENCE (Neon – TBD): Steven Soderbergh has always appreciated, and often demanded, a challenge, and in Presence he and screenwriter David Koepp have taken an original approach to the haunted house genre. The point of view character here is the ghost itself, who we’re told has an inchoate consciousness that can’t distinguish between past and present, and whose identity only becomes clear at the film’s climax. Soderbergh, who as usual serves as his own cinematographer (and editor) under pseudonyms, is himself essentially playing the spirit, who constantly roams the house in suburban New York where it resides. (Each scene is structured as one continuous fluid shot.) Its wandering becomes focused when a family moves in: Rebekah (Lucy Liu), Chris (Chris Sullivan), and their teen children Chloe (Callina Liang) and Tyler (Eddy Maday). The ghost seems attuned to the stresses among the group. Rebekah is a driven businesswoman who may cross ethical (and legal?) lines, and her marriage to Chris seems to be heading for the rocks. Tyler is determined to achieve status in his new school, disdainful of his father and sister. Most troubled is Chloe, the reason for the family’s move after two girls she knew (one her best friend) died in quick succession from reported overdoses, now struggling to bounce back from that trauma Sometimes the ghost just watches, but when exercised it can marshal poltergeist powers, realized through some nifty old-time in-camera tricks. Presence isn’t major Soderbergh (and he and Koepp seem to realize that, keeping the running time to a swift 85 minutes), but it’s been put together with the assurance of a master. Utilizing a single location, a small cast and one visual gimmick, it delivers spookily accomplished visuals, tightening suspense, and a remarkably satisfying finale. On its own small, low-key terms, it’s a reminder that Soderbergh is one of the best we’ve got.
I SAW THE TV GLOW (A24 – TBD): Jane Schoenbrun’s debut film We’re All Going To the World’s Fair had a micro budget and barely received a theatrical release, but its jagged, ambiguous storytelling about getting lost in the internet earned it critical raves (90% on Rotten Tomatoes) and cult status. Their follow-up is a more ambitious take on similar subjects. This time, instead of an online game that scrambles psyches, the medium affecting lost souls is a 1990s world-building YA fantasy-horror TV series (think Buffy The Vampire Slayer but with a fraction of the budget) called “The Pink Opaque”. While still in middle school, Owen (Justice Smith) is drawn to the series by the slightly older Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine), whose queerness doesn’t affect Owen’s fascination with her. Owen isn’t allowed to stay up late enough to watch the series live, so his experience with “The Pink Opaque” is through a series of deceptions and subterfuge, starting with secret sleepovers in Maddy’s basement, and continuing through smuggled VHS tapes. Even when the series is cancelled, the obsession remains and even deepens, as both Owen and Maddy find themselves subsumed within its mythology, and the boundaries between reality and fantasy grow blurry. Schoenbrun’s finger is on the exhilarating and sometimes terrifying way pop culture is increasingly keyed to fixation, and the way compulsive fandom can take over a life. I Saw the TV Glow is often transfixing, and Schoenbrun has a command over tone and the ambiguous performances, but at this point in their career, they’re not very interested in narrative, and the film alternately crawls and jumps forward in time. While a clear forebear of the filmmaker’s work is David Lynch, Schoenbrun has yet to attempt a crossover project like Blue Velvet or Twin Peaks with appeal beyond fans of the avant-garde. Their work may not (yet) appeal widely–although A24 will doubtless push I Saw the TV Glow with all its considerable might–but Schoenbrun is already a remarkable, distinctive talent.
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