It’s time for another one of those films where a malicious entity works to break a family apart. These spirits definitely like to go for the slow corruption angle to speed up the drama but sometimes you wonder what the end game is. Is it just to mess with everyone and the spirit enjoys the chaos or is it something deeper? Because the former would come off as rather petty if you think about it. Nothing wrong with petty for a villain but it’s something you think about when the main plot isn’t super gripping.

The film starts with the evil box claiming its first victim. An older lady was unfortunately the first fighter to go up against the box and she was unable to withstand its supernatural barrage. She is thrown around for a bit and gets murdered. So the family decides to sell the box off, where it is taken by Emily. This leads to our main characters. Clyde and Stephanie divorced about a year ago and while things are tense, at least they don’t fully hate each other. They have the two daughters Hannah and Emily on rotating shifts and things seem to be fine. Emily hopes they will get back together but that doesn’t seem to be in the cards. Emily starts to act rather off after getting the box though. Is it…haunted????

I mean we watched the opening scene so we already know the truth. It takes most of the film for the main characters to know what is going on as well so it’s a bit of a slow burn. I have a few issues with this movie to be sure but I will say that it beats the average horror film. Not a hard thing to do of course but it’s still a win so we’ll take it. Basically, one issue I had here is it’s one of those films where the heroes don’t really have much of a chance. The spirit can directly control people, amps up their physical abilities, can push people around with telekinesis, etc. It doesn’t really have any limitations and can operate over a large area. So the average person has no hope without a significant amount of plot armor. Not very fair now is it?

So one of the big problems with a film like this is it feels rather pointless at times. Even when the heroes do take the threat seriously and try dealing with it, at best they start to delay things. It is a horror film so make sure you stay all the way through to the ending. It’s not as annoying as something like the Grudge but yeah they really need to give these things some more weaknesses. Like some kind of a physical form or some defenses that the humans can use to fight back a little bit.

There are a solid amount of fake jump scares to buy time for the real ones. As a result though, almost every jump in the first half is fake. You have raccoons breaking and entering along with insects also pulling stuff off. It definitely makes for a tough combination for the poor father who is already trying to navigate a difficult situation and doesn’t have time for all of this supernatural mumbo jumbo.

On the human side, the film does a good job of not vilifying either of the parents too much at least. Stephanie maybe seems a little more antagonistic since the film is from Clyde’s point of view but at least it’s nothing too crazy. She is moving on with her life and is tired of Clyde always holding her back. The fact that he was even late to pick up the kids has to be annoying. He also seems a little too jealous of her new boyfriend considering that they’re broken up. At that point it’s not really any of his business. They’re not together anymore so he’s gotta just move on.

The new boyfriend doesn’t seem all that bad either. He’s a bit obnoxious but not to a crazy extent. I don’t think you’re meant to care about the guy all that much so his screentime tends to be minimal. As for Clyde, I wouldn’t say he does a great job of connecting to the kids. He’s busy and has calls that have to be picked up and stuff like that but for the most part I wouldn’t say that he is making any critical mistakes or anything. Clyde does put a lot of work into saving Emilly so he tried his best.

Emily is super annoying but you do have to consider that most of this is the box’s fault. She’s not usually as crazy as she appears. Emily is maybe a bit too naive and all but she is younger. Hannah seems like a good older sister who is always trying to look at things rationally. Kids just aren’t ready to fight a supernatural monster, even the adults were really at the end of their rope there.

I guess the main issue here is that this film isn’t doing anything new, different, or exciting. It’s you run of the mill film about possession which isn’t a super interesting topic anyway. It’s not going to do anything to change your mind on the subject. I like the fact that it is a bit tamer than other films in the genre. It’s not super violent although it does have some moments like the principal getting blinded. It goes more for shock value and gross imagery like spitting out a bunch of flies and things like that. It was interesting how some of the stuff was actually happening as opposed to illusions. It made for an interesting scene where the fumigators had to be called in to get rid of them. It’s a small note but that was nice.

Still, the film just isn’t going to hold your interest for very long unless you’re really into the genre. Maybe if the spirit had more personality or there were some interesting dialogues about how to take it down. This would work better in a setting where the supernatural was common place. Then at least this could be a solid back and forth with both sides using their full arsenal. Because it is more of a first encounters kind of film though, it’s just the humans getting wrecked for a while.

Overall, You know a film isn’t holding your attention when you’re more interested in the basketball team’s fate than the actual main plot. The film actually avoids most of the big horror traps so I appreciate that but at the same time it’s nowhere near being at the level it would need to be for me to call it a good movie. Being boring is a really bad offense for any kind of film. So in the end I would give this one a thumbs down without a doubt. You’re better off finding some other supernatural title to watch like Ghostbusters.

Overall 4/10