Now on Netflix: This Horror Movie Will “Make you gasp and jump out of your seat”
Mike Flanagan is the reigning master of modern horror. Whether all his films have worked for you or not, there’s no denying that the beating heart of today’s horror movies are conceptually the core of everything Mike Flanagan has helmed. There is a direct throughline between Flanagan’s arrival on the scene and the advent of trauma horror. Flanagan, after all, understands trauma better than most horror filmmakers, and you can always count on his films to boast an earnest, beating heart.
Whether it’s the success he’s had on Netflix with the likes of The Haunting of Hill House or Midnight Mass, his dalliances with Stephen King adaptations, or his first non-horror feature in a while (The Life of Chuck, as sincere as you’d hope), Flanagan shows no signs of slowing down. It might be worth checking out his feature debut, Absentia. I revisited the film last year and totally changed my mind on it. Once you’ve done that, why not check out his mainstream, breakout success? The film is currently streaming on Netflix. Learn more about Oculus, which might just be Flanagan’s best film, below:
Per Netflix: Now young adults, Tim and Kaylie are still trying to recover from — and get to the bottom of — their parents’ deaths more than a decade later.
Absentia is great, don’t get me wrong, but everything Flanagan has helmed since 2013 is a direct consequence of Oculus. The style, the emotion, the troupe, the damned Lasser Glass—all of them remain core components of Flanagan’s filmmaking style. Full disclosure? He’s my favorite working horror filmmaker today, and the closest contemporary of Wes Craven (my favorite filmmaker) I can think of. Oculus is the real deal, and whether for the first time or a rewatch, it’s one mirror worth losing yourself in.
In our strangely prescient review from 2013, we wrote, “Oculus succeeds in having one of the most moving conclusions this reviewer has seen, and the shocking climax is guaranteed to make you gasp and jump out of your seat. After the successful premiere of Oculus, genre fans should not be surprised that Mike Flanagan is bound to be a future household name in horror.” That he is. Thanks, Oculus. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.
What do you think? Do you have any plans to check out Oculus on Netflix? Where would you rank it among Flanagan’s filmography? Let me know over on Twitter @Chadiscollins.
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