I was definitely interested in seeing this moive when I saw it advertised at the cinema. The whole idea of a small group of people trapped in a small space, being watched by unseen creatures on the other side of a mirror, was one that immediately interested me.
The movie started out in a fairly similar way to most horror movies, with a man running through the forest, trying to escape or find his way out while being chased by an unseen creature. That opening scene ends with what was included in the trailer: with the man being dragged away by the same unseen creature that’s apparently been stalking him. Either way, he doesn’t really appear in the rest of the movie…although he is mentioned.
I found Mina a bit of a difficult character to really empathise with, as she was hiding who she was with various people even before she’s stranded in the forest. The start of the movie is a little slow-moving, but it moves a bit faster once Mina finds herself stranded in the forest.
While I did find the whole concept of being watched by strange, unseen entities to be really interesting, I did think that if I was in Mina’s position, I would have been asking a whole lot more questions. For instance, she doesn’t ask anything about this Professor that Daniel mentions. I found it very hard to believe that she wouldn’t have mentioned anything at all about this extra person who’s referenced, but isn’t actually there.
Madeline, Ciara and Daniel seem to have accepted the whole idea of being watched, but while Ciara mentions her husband has left to try and get help, she doesn’t actually seem worried about his safety at all. It’s a little hard to really feel like there’s much danger in this movie, as apart from the opening scene and a few instances where the watchers are banging on the cabin, unable to get in, the characters always seem able to escape danger. It’s also not very clear what the consequences for breaking these ‘rules’ are, apart from the watchers reacting badly by banging and trying to get in. Have they killed anyone apart from the guy at the beginning, who none of them seem worried about? Again, I feel like this is a question Mina should have asked. What happens if we break the rules? When she inevitably turned her back on the mirror, I was expecting something to happen…but unfortunately, nothing did.
I also found that this movie contradicted itself towards the end. I had the feeling it was more about bringing in a twist than making sure it made sense with what had been established before. There were very few clues pointing towards the twist at the end.
On the whole, I think there was a lot of potential in this movie. Sadly, though, it just fell short of what it could have been.