Observance (2015)

directed by Joseph Sims-Dennett
Australia
90 minutes
4.5 stars out of 5
----

Observance has gotten a little hype this year from people outside the mainstream horror circles, but for a while I was hesitant to watch it because it gave me the impression that it would be one of those "dude angst"-type horror films: Movies where the horror stems from some guy's frustration towards a woman and the blame for whatever happens is pinned on said woman. Given the title, I also expected something where stalking would either be depicted as justified or as something more nuanced and meaningful than the horrific experience it actually is, but it turns out that the main character is actually a spy, so while his spying on a woman is unethical it isn't exactly like he's just doing it to be perverted. There's some weird stuff later on where the main character hints at becoming attracted to his target but honestly all of that had no bearing on the plot and really didn't need to be there.

The true center of this movie isn't the spying. There's heavy emphasis on a feeling of being watched, but the main character isn't the only one who's doing the watching, and the woman he's spying on has an unclear role in the bigger picture. What happens when we take the power away from the observer, make it so they're not omniscient with their binoculars and wiretaps anymore? The answer to that is what makes Observance so unnerving.

The cinematography is gorgeous but what this movie really nails is the sound design. Horror films use so many different sounds to accompany their most frightening scenes- a crescendo of dissonant strings, a sudden jolt of music, even sometimes a noise so high-pitched humans can't hear it, intended to create a baseless fear- but this movie has none of that. This movie uses total silence when it needs to reinforce a point. With what seems like minimal effort, it gets you into that state where you think you hear something and all you can do is be as quiet as possible, straining to hear it.

There's something hiding just under this film's silences and its dingy exterior, but I don't know what it is. I don't even think the movie itself knows what it is. It feels like the whole thing is harboring a ghost, but at the same time putting the term "ghost" to what happens here implies something that, while supernatural, is still ultimately understandable- everybody knows ghosts, you die and you become one and you haunt people. But the fear conjured up in this film is something that somehow goes beyond that. Beyond fear and into sheer dread and paranoia, paranoia, paranoia.

This is probably the closest any movie has gotten to imitating Suspect Zero, which I've thought for a long time was basically the pinnacle in cinematic dread (and undeserving of its lukewarm reception). If the uncomfortable, sickly-looking greens and yellows of this film were replaced by industrial greys and hard monochromatics, it would come off like a lost E. Elias Merhige film.

I guess the only thing I wasn't particularly fond of was how heavily this movie leans on the "vomiting black goo" horror trope. Every time a movie has to convey a character being corrupted or possessed, the black goo is turned to as a catch-all symbol of body integrity failure. Although to be fair the intensity with which our main character in Observance hacks up the stuff is a bit more forceful than usual. I also have to say, I'm not totally happy with the ending- obviously I want to stay away from spoilers but it just felt like after all that buildup there probably wasn't any way the film could have ended that would feel like a fitting climax to all that dread. 5 minutes of boring ending definitely doesn't take away from 85 minutes of ideal horror filmmaking.