Thoughts on Steven Soderbergh's "Presence"

 

I've been very vocal about my opinion on movie run times:  I think most are simply too long, and would be sharply improved if trimmed by 15-20 minutes. 

It's gotten to the point where finding anything under two hours feels like a miracle, and run times of three hours or more are way too common (The Brutalist, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Oppenheimer I'm looking at you). While there are plenty of people who think every minute of those award-winning movies is gold, I think they'd all be better if they were trimmed by about 25%.

This is why I was thrilled to see that our local movie theater was playing Presence. Steven Soderbergh's latest has a wonderfully tight run time of 85 minutes. And at a time when Hollywood budgets seem to be experiencing yet another growth spurt, it was reportedly made for under $2 million and shot over just 11 days.

And here's the most important thing: I liked it a lot.

Lucy Liu is the most recognizable name as Rebekah, the mother of a family that moves into a new home with their two teenagers. Chris Sullivan, who plays the dad, is best known for his work as Toby in the series This is Us. We quickly learn that they've moved to help give daughter Chloe (Callina Lang) a fresh start after the sudden death of her best friend, who we never see.

What we DO see is a rather dizzying tour of the empty house by what we quickly come to realize is a ghost. Soderbergh does double duty here as the DP under his alternate name Peter Andrews, as the ghost twists and turns through first the empty house, then the lived-in version. I did find this aspect a bit dizzying at times, but my eyes adjusted and I appreciate the approach.

Every character here is flawed and quite a few story lines are left intentionally unanswered. I quickly found myself rooting for the ghost, who intervenes on Chloe's behalf in ways that are humorous more than scary. And when she takes up with the best friend of her older brother Tyler (Eddy Maday), trouble is clearly coming - and it does, with a shockingly strong ending.

The moral of Presence is simple: don't be an asshole.The ending clearly left the door open for a sequel -who moves into this once-again empty house next? I'd definitely be there for that as well.

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