Director: Alexandre Aja
Cast: Keifer Sutherland, Paula Patton
Rating: **1/2
Like many over exaggerated Asian imports, ‘Mirrors’ fails to intellectually translate preternatural scares for the audiences. ‘Mirrors’ really isn’t a horror film but an enigma, with Ben desperately trying to unearth the mystery than deal with the demonic force. Aja’s attempt to shift from his scare zone only proves his incapability to process the material at hand.
Reeling from an accidental shooting during his time as a NYPD detective, B
en Carson (Kiefer Sutherland, putting forth minimal effort) has drowned his guilt in booze and rage. Trying to clean up his act and win his family (including Amy Smart and Paula Patton) back, Ben takes a job as a security officer guarding the spooky ruins of a department store that suffered a massive fire. During his rounds, Ben spies strange visions in the massive mirrors that decorate the hallways, images that forecast gruesome death. Attempting to investigate the history of the store and its past tragedy, Ben finds he’s brought the visions home to terrorize his loved ones, forcing him to fight back against the ghostly wrath of the mysterious reflections.
Although, Mirrors may have been recycled it’s easily one of the best horror premises to hit the screen in years. Reflections in this film appear pretty much everywhere, not only in mirrors but in doorknobs, windows and even water. And this very concept in the film makes your experience chilling. The inescapability from reflections, powered by a demonic force, is one of the best supernatural plots since Nightmare on Elm Street. The fact that whatever the mirror images do to themselves happens to their real life counterparts, only heightens the despair of Carson and his family
The biggest downfall of the film is when it tries to provide an explanation for th
e horrific events taking place in the second half. The idea of one’s image terrorizing oneself is horrifying on one level, but at the same time, it’s extremely unrealistic. Trying to explain why this happens, back fires on the film, as no explanation is going to make sense and instead, will just draw attention to the fact that this would never happen in real life, destroying a bit of the film’s effect.
Ambiguity in this case would be much more frightening and wouldn’t take away from any of the other scares. Once you throw in a sub-plot about mental institution experiments and haunting tragedies taking place in the building, you lose a lot of the suspense. Despite the intriguing first half and unwise direction in its second half, it’s still entertaining and manages to retain a few good scares here and there, while finally rebounding in the last.
