This simmering slow burn is not horror as it was marketed. Instead its a meditation on purpose, being present, and being forgotten. It is the story of a "presence", perhaps a ghost, in a home with a family that has moved in. Unlike The Others this isn't about conflict between the living and the dead but the connections.
Presence is a rather sleight story but its focus on what it is doing makes it effective. We, the audience, see things from its perspective, understand things as it does. It is figuring out what its purpose is as are we. It is striving for reasons for communications for understanding. This is very much what an audience does when watching a film.
The film's crescendo happens rather quickly moving from comparative banality to some immediate emotional resonance. That was a bit jarring for me even if the film had built to the moment in subtle ways. The climax happens quickly, fitting with the film's general calm focus, but it is over a bit sooner than we'd expect.
The final moments have the most resonance and will make for good after-movie conversation. This is the sort of story and film that asks us questions and gets us thinking which is always quite refreshing.
Presence
Starring: Lucy Liu, Chris Sullivan, Callina Lang, Eddie Maday, West Mullholland
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Writer: David Koepp
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