SEANCE (2021)

Studio:      Shudder/RLJE Films
Director:    Simon Barrett
Writer:      Simon Barrett
Producer:  John Schoenfelder, Russell Ackerman, Tomas “Dutch” Deckaj, Alex Mace, Matthew Baker, Isaac Clements
Stars:     Suki Waterhouse, Ella-Rae Smith, Madisen Beaty, Inanna Sarkis, Seamus Patterson, Stephanie Sy, Djouliet Amara, Jade Michael, Megan Best, Marina Stephenson Kerr

Review Score:

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Summary:

After students conduct a séance to contact a dead girl’s ghost, a series of supernatural murders spreads throughout an all-girls school.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Edelvine Academy for Girls students Alice, Bethany, and Lenora play a prank on classmates Yvonne, Rosalind, and Kerrie by staging a paranormal encounter with ‘The Edelvine Ghost,’ which is a Bloody Mary-like urban legend involving a previous student who supposedly committed suicide. Distraught by the prank, Kerrie returns to her room alone. After seemingly encountering supernatural activity, Kerrie falls out of her window and dies on the ground outside.

Transfer student Camille Meadows takes Kerrie’s place at the school. Camille befriends social outcast Helina as well as handyman Trevor, who is the son of headmistress Mrs. Landry.

Alice and her friends bully Camille, which leads to a fistfight between Camille and Alice. As punishment for the physical altercation, Mrs. Landry has Camille, Alice, Helina, Bethany, Lenora, Yvonne, and Rosalind serve detention in the library.

Alice and her friends convince Camille and Helina to join them for a Ouija-like séance to contact Kerrie. Although Camille and Helina anticipate another prank, the girls seemingly contact a spirit who warns that they are going to be murdered. Everyone wonders if they actually summoned Kerrie or The Edelvine Ghost with their rituals. Later that night, Lenora is killed.

Because Lenora’s personal belongings were missing from her room, Mrs. Landry concludes Lenora ran away. Suspicious about Lenora’s disappearance, the girls investigate Lenora’s room with Trevor’s help. The girls find a stylized cross drawn in blood on Lenora’s bed sheets. Further research reveals that Alice Kane, the dead student who supposedly became The Edelvine Ghost, wore a pendant with the same cross.

Rosalind is killed in the shower, but her death is deemed an accident. Camille and Helina comfort each other and discuss the possibility of ghosts after Camille finds Rosalind’s body.

Bethany screams when she is attacked in her room, but the masked intruder disappears. Although Bethany claims the attacker was The Edelvine Ghost, Mrs. Landry dismisses the experience as a bad dream. Camille also discounts the possibility of a ghost since Bethany was able to scare away the intruder.

Alice, Camille, Helina, Bethany, and Yvonne meet for another séance so they can question Rosalind. Rosalind seemingly identifies Camille as her killer, prompting another punch from Alice and further suspicion from Bethany. Shortly afterward, a masked attacker slashes Yvonne’s throat while she is alone.

Still feeling as though Kerrie haunts her room, Camille spends the night with Helina. Alice receives a message from Yvonne’s phone asking her to come outside. Camille tries to follow Alice, but a masked attacker knocks her out from behind. Another masked attacker then knocks Alice unconscious.

Camille wakes up restrained alongside Alice in the library. Bethany and Trevor unmask themselves as the murderers. Bethany explains that she won a $250,000 scholarship by stealing an essay from Kerrie. Bethany killed everyone who could have exposed her plagiarism and covered it up by exploiting the ghost story to fake the séances. Trevor additionally reveals that he killed Alice Kane, who was his babysitter, and staged her death to look like a suicide. Trevor eventually became Bethany’s secret lover. Bethany now plots to frame Camille as the mastermind behind the murders.

Awoken by a vision of Kerrie’s ghost, Helina rushes to the library to rescue Camille. Camille kills Bethany by stabbing her in the throat with a broken fluorescent light bulb. While Helina escorts Alice to safety, Camille beheads Trevor with a fallen bookcase.

In the aftermath, Helina confronts Camille when she spots her sneaking away from the school. Camille confesses she stole the real Camille’s identity in order to infiltrate the academy. Because Kerrie was her best friend growing up, Camille wanted to avenge Kerrie’s death. Helina asks Camille how she will be able to find her in the future. Camille merely kisses Helina goodbye and walks away.

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Review:

Edelvine Academy for Girls has its own version of the Bloody Mary myth. Supposedly, the ghost of a former student can be conjured if certain steps are performed in the bathroom where she committed suicide.

Alice and her friends try the urban legend’s ritual and seemingly summon a haunting phantom who rises from a blood-filled tub to give the girls a jolt. Everyone’s eerie encounter turns out to be a paranormal prank of course. However, the unexpected death that occurs down the hall afterward turns into a very real tragedy.

That unfortunate death opens up a spot at the school for transferring teenager Camille, played by Suki Waterhouse despite the actress being ten years older than the role. Although she befriends social outcast Helina as well as young handyman Trevor, Camille quickly earns the ire of Alice’s catty clique for the classic crime of simply being the “new girl.”

An altercation between Alice and Camille earns everyone detention. To pass the time, Alice proposes a séance to contact the spirit of the girl who just died. Alice’s cronies have another prank planned, but a genuine ghost apparently has other ideas. Whatever these girls awakened with their games, they’ve become unwitting players in a series of slayings where each of them is a target for murder.

In a vacuum, “Séance” might be dismissed with a limp wave of the hand as a by-the-book B-movie. As sorority-ish slashers go, “Séance” is pretty drab. Apart from a few girls vaguely circling around expected stereotypes such as bullying bitch and brainy misfit, the only way to distinguish anyone is by hairstyle and ethnicity. Almost everyone acts interchangeably, lacking any colorful vitality that could liven the film’s plain personality. The girls are just “there,” sleepily slogging around and waiting to react to supernatural stimulation.

Infrequent action relies heavily on textbook tricks. When plot progression requires putting a person on pause so the storyline can turn its attention somewhere else, those people end up smacked in the skull and knocked unconscious, which happens more times than can be counted on one hand. When an imaginary alarm signals too much time has passed since the audience’s heartbeat inched toward elevation, “Séance” throws in another nightmare sequence to squeeze out a quick spook. Other scares are of traditional types too, including flickering lights, brief glimpses of apparent apparitions, and books dropping from shelves.

Horror fans might afford “Séance’s” boilerplate boos a little more leniency when they realize it’s Simon Barrett’s feature film directorial debut. Barrett made his hay as a writer, almost exclusively for Adam Wingard movies like “You’re Next” (review here), “The Guest” (review here), and “Blair Witch” (review here). Barrett became a known name in indie horror as a result of this résumé.

When you look at the movie with that understanding, “Séance’s” familiar formula makes more practical sense. Streamlining his script for simplicity, Barrett deliberately keeps things basic so he doesn’t bite off more than can be comfortably chewed. He’s not going to wow filmgoers who can see around every corner through heavy-lidded eyes, especially since the twist is telegraphed from the first conspicuously staged killing. But I’m not sure that impressing viewers with originality was ever Barrett’s primary intention anyway.

“Séance” seems more like Simon Barrett’s audition to prove how competently he can direct an ordinary scary movie, and he passes that interview just fine. While veteran horror watchers may be bored by “Séance” treading well-trod turf instead of attempting to break new ground, Hollywood producers will see “Séance” as a perfectly passable thriller with the desired bullet points down pat. Never mind flat characters like a stuffy headmistress with her hair tied tight or some slightly creative kills undercut by bargain CG FX. “Séance” boasts a photogenic cast, a 90-minute runtime, clear heroes and villains, a mild mystery, and milder chills tailored to teen-centric tastes that prefer safe over spicy.

I don’t expect experienced viewers to get much out of “Séance.” It doesn’t pack the punch to leave a lasting bruise. But I do expect we’ll see Simon Barrett getting another go in the director’s chair on an average Blumhouse project or something similar in the future. Because if nothing else, “Séance” shows he can make mainstream frights that put form and function first as economically as anyone.

Review Score: 50

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