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Oculus-2014-Movie-Poster-ImagesThere’s a lot to not-like in the trailer for Oculus, the upcoming horror film starring Karen (she’ll always be Amy Pond to us) Gillian. The movie may be good, bad, or indifferent – who’s to say, trailers are works of ‘art,’ to use the term loosely, all by themselves these days, pretty much independent of the look, feel, or quality of the film they promote. But the trailer exhibits at least four of the most egregious horror-movie-trailer clichés currently in use

 

  1. That awful “Buh-WOWwwww…” sound. Has there been a horror or action movie of the last, say, decade that hasn’t cranked up the bass for this big, deep, WOWing sound just before something major happens? It’s reached the point that it not only doesn’t work, in induces a groan of boredom with the first ‘buh’.
  2. Smash. Cut. Smash. Cut. No. Story. Smash. Cut. It leads one to believe that there really isn’t any there there, if the trailer can’t give us a single scene, even a single line of dialogue. All we get out of this is “pretty gory haunted mirror,” which tells us essentially nothing. And none of the images are particularly new or interesting (bleeding mouth! Dragged out of frame! Spin around screaming!)
  3. Nursery rhyme.  But not really. Maybe it started with Nightmare on Elm Street, way back when: hearing the VO of some kids chanting a jump-rope rhyme or chanting couplet. Kind’a a spooky, yeah…in 1972. Now: another groaner, used to replace a lack of plot or original catch phrase. Please to stop, not again. We just want it all to end.
  4. Pop open those glow-y eyes! Did it start with Insidious, maybe? Glowing eyes in a darkened face have been around forever, of course – probably one of the first and easiest optical fx even last century – but having somebody (usually a kid or a very unkempt woman) POP his or her eyes open, with the inevitably accompanying SHOCK CHORD!, as if that’ll just scare the bejeezus out of you…well, doesn’t scare the bejeezus out of anybody anymore.

See for yourself. By the way, Oculus, starring Katee (I’m not just Starbuck anymore!) Sackhoff and Karen (Leave Amy Pond alone!) Gillian opens nationwide on April 11.