White Noise is one of those desperate horror films that actually snagged an interesting idea but rushed to churn out some random product that barely made use of it. I can’t say I was all that disappointed because to be honest I had fairly low expectations going into it. The movie’s fairly bad as you would guess. The villains are overpowered with no weaknesses and the whole film is an exercise in futility. At least the film has some restraint and doesn’t go too crazy though.

The film starts off with Jonathan being married to Anna and she is even expecting a kid which is hype. Unfortunately she dies after that so Jonathan gets rather depressed. He ends up meeting a shady guy who was following him around for a while though named Raymond. He dabbles in the arcane arts and explains that Sarah’s spirit can still be heard through the computer. They just have to listen hard enough and he’s a pro at the electro voice phenomenon and has made it his life’s work. He’s been helping another lady named Sarah as well. Now she can help Jonathan a bit because Raymond gets bumped off soon after. The spirits don’t appreciate this intrusion and plan to keep on murdering people. What can Jonathan do against these demonic entities?

Nothing to be honest. Lol you thought this guy could do anything about it? These ghosts are intangible, they’ve got super speed, super strength, endless stamina, they can control your body and make you jump out a window, etc. Their abilities are basically limitless so all Jonathan can do is flail around for a while until the ghosts have had enough of him. That’s my main problem with some titles like this. You have to at least introduce a concept that gives Jonathan some kind of a chance in this fight. Otherwise, what is even the point of watching the film? It’s just pointless if his only escape is his inevitable death. At that point then what are we even doing here?

The film also gets rather boring at times. It’s good that Jonathan is super good at hearing because half the time I couldn’t even get what the ghosts were saying through the computer screen. It could be like gibberish at times and I’m someone who tends to like white noise. I use it every night to create that hype atmosphere although I’ve thought about buying a more custom noise like a rainforest sound or something. I think those could even be more fun although I haven’t tried that yet. But even so it’s not something that can carry a movie. I did appreciate that most of the transitions were done using white noise though. The general colors, backgrounds, and effects weren’t bad either.

There just isn’t a lot of them to go around and they tend to be very repetitive. Also, it goes through the annoying cliche of only the evil spirits having power while the good ones can only repeat one or two phrases like an NPC. Anna shows up a few times to tell Jonathan to run but she never gives any more details than that. Also lets face it, running’s not even going to do anything at this point although I appreciate the attempt. No, he’s doomed no matter how you slice it.

One plot point that starts kind of late is how Jonathan can quickly see into the future. He is given glimpses into different dark fates that await various characters but with enough time to save them or help out in time. He does help out a bit but I’d be annoyed with this ability because it doesn’t come with any hints or anything. He just has to run around until he finds out what is going on. It’s also usually a half victory as someone still dies or gets injured while he saves someone else.

Ultimately though, it’s all rather futile like I mentioned. Jonathan never stood a chance at winning or doing much of anything. Depending on how you interpret the ending, it’s not looking much better for the other characters either. Part of the ending is a little funny though with some more static noise showing up and we get one last line from one of the characters. Everyone looks either shocked or happy except for the driver who is over the whole thing. He just drives off looking rather annoyed and I don’t blame him because from his point of view the whole thing’s probably been a real drag. Now he’s going to have to compete with a legacy that will probably be dramatized a bit. If he was in the sequel I’d bet that things would not go well for him.

Ultimately the message here is really not to mess with the dead and spirits. Once someone dies then you’ve gotta move on and fast. No trying to contact them or anything because you’re just going to be going around in circles and contacting demons anyway. I’d also say you should never trust some random guy who’s been following you around and telling you all of these weird stories. I get that Jonathan was desperate but yeah you definitely need to be able to move on. Not rebound of course, but just keep it calm and not chase after her spirit.

The film also has a really random plot twist near the end of the film that doesn’t make any sense. Feels more like a shock value moment than anything to be honest. Lets just say there is one human villain here to make things a little more tense at the end but there’s just no point to that. We already know that the demons can do anything they want so why involve a human? Just to mess with the main character? That seems like the only possible explanation. The demons strike me as really unreasonable villains who always have some kind of a chip on their shoulders even when they are the ones who created the situation. Yeah they’re not winning any points in my book any time soon.

Overall, At the end of the day there’s not much to positive to really say about the film. It’s a very by the numbers horror film but it doesn’t have a ton of good jump scares. The computer screen moments tend to be on the boring side and you’re really waiting for some action. Unfortunately there’s not much for the main character to even fight for most of the film and by the time we get a human villain the film is ending. This is a film that should have had more fun with the electronic setup. That should have also played into the demons weakness somehow. You know, just give us something with a bit more substance instead of dwelling on the computer screen for so long. Additionally the whole sub plot of Jonathan playing superhero by seeing into the future didn’t make a lot of sense and felt shoehorned in. The film just didn’t have time to really go into this plot so it felt pointless.

Overall 3/10