After the Lights Out: The bravest thing to do is face your fears.

A few years ago, a famous horror short film was circulated on the Internet, called "After Turning Off the Lights". When I saw it, I was all overwhelmed by the horror that it created in just a few minutes. Especially under the cultural shackles that I cannot have ghosts after the founding of the Great Celestial Dynasty, it is even more difficult to see a horror movie that contains elements of our life and is full of horror. Some time ago, after the long-awaited Wen Ziren's authentic horror series "The Conjuring 2", the long-awaited horror film "After the Lights", which was produced by him and adapted from the three-minute short film "After the Lights", is super hot. Value for money swept the cinema.
In 2013, David Sandberg's short film "After the Lights" tells a reverie story of loneliness and fear that we have experienced almost since childhood. What's in the dark place? When a child lives lonely and helpless in a dark environment, it seems that there is always a terrifying existence hidden in the dark light and shadow, and the lack of vision will always affect the brain's judgment. Perhaps many people have also experienced the fright and helplessness of running in the dark and seeming to feel that someone is chasing behind them. It is these childhood experiences that everyone knows and everyone has been refined and processed by David Sandberg, and his wife Lothar Rosen's front stage performance in the short film has refined this horror element.

But when a three-minute short was turned into a film, the test for David Sandberg was greatly increased. Because the film production company invited David to personally direct this feature film that was included in formal production because of him. The short-form video only needs to enlarge the most terrifying part of the picture, and the film requires a complete story and the tacit cooperation between the various technical skills has become a rigid indicator that must be completed.
The adaptation of the film "After the Lights" invested 4.9 million US dollars. As far as I know, the investment in the field of horror films is higher than that of pseudo-documentaries such as "Ghost Story". One month after its release, the North American box office reached 63.1 million US dollars, and the overseas market received 41.7 million US dollars without including Europe and Asia, a sturdy record! At the same time, the reputation of this film is also at an upper-middle level, and it has a good start. I hope that after Wen Ziren, there will be another hero in the field of horror movies.
Going back to the movie itself, the 80-minute time basically hasn't reached the basic line of a normal movie, but it is enough to tell a complete story with a cause and a climax end. The movie tells a story: Rebecca has been away from home for many years, but she still can't get rid of the lingering childhood shadow after returning home. This terrible nightmare is that when she turns on and off the lights, the things that appear in front of her always make it difficult for her to distinguish the real from the fake. Her brother Martin is now experiencing the horrors she experienced. Behind the horrific phenomenon, an evil spirit named Diana is interfering with their lives. Diana, who was hidden in the dark, was once her mother's best friend during her mental depression and was hospitalized, and then died of a medical accident. Now, Diana's ghost has returned to her mother again, and she wants her best friend. Her friend will be with her forever, and anyone who tries to get close will face death threats.
The famous scene in the short film "After Turning Off the Lights" was reproduced on the screen in the first 3 minutes of the film. Interestingly, it was the wife of director David Sandberg who led the audience on this terrifying journey. The heroine Lothar Rosen. She made a friendly cameo in the film, playing Esther, an employee of Rebecca's stepfather's textile factory. (The director's private goods ^_^, Esther is a Jewish heroine)

Before the title appears at 7 minutes and 20 seconds, the rhythm of a horror movie is very beautiful. In the textile factory at night, all kinds of plastic models are quiet under the lights. The mystery of Esther's first sight of the evil spirit under the induction lamp also satiated the audience's appetite. The death struggle of his stepfather Wells revealed the evil spirit's features of avoiding light, humanoid and brutality in a closed space like a drama stage. And Wells's account of talking with his son and looking through his wife's information made the audience think about the relationship between evil spirits and family. Such a start is indeed above the standard. It's a pity that this terrifying power and emotional tension is weakened when the film turns to family members. The movie's climax is not reignited until the final episode where all the characters stay at their mother's house and fight the evil spirit Diana. The plot narrative is still a bit weak throughout the development of the story.
Depressed or schizophrenic mother once asked Diana not to hurt her family when she accommodated Diana's soul or undead body, but when she saw that her daughter was about to lose her life, she resolutely aimed the gun at herself. Mother's love is great, and her mother's final death is neat enough, but she is ruthless in expressing her mother and Diana's decades of love-hate entanglement, which makes the emotional point of mother's saving her daughter's death not enough to influence the audience's viewing. fun. How does the mother finally understand Diana's saying "without me there is no you"? Is it the undead body or the dead evil spirit? If the screenwriter can sort out the relationship between each other on the basis of more than 80 minutes into the film, and add some horror plot points, then the reputation of the film will be further improved.

The most intuitive performance in the field of horror films lies in the sound effect of listening to the sudden thunder in a silent place, the evil charm in the art scene, and the emotional rendering caused by the sudden blowing of air in the use of the camera lens. Excellent horror films are mostly in this way. The most criticized thing is the lower limit of IQ of all the characters in horror films, which sometimes makes people laugh. And this kind of advantage "After Turning Off the Lights" is not very skilled, but it also shows, such shortcomings are easily avoided at certain moments. The most worth mentioning here is Rebecca's cute and handsome boyfriend. It's no fun to go on after so many spoilers. The boyfriend is indeed a warm existence in the movie.

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