The Quiet Ones

Director: John Pogue, Starring: Jared Harris, Sam Claflin, and Olivia Cooke

What does Based on a true story mean in cinema these days? When attached to historical or dramatic films, we know the phrase is vague and fluid but how does it apply to horror flicks; stories that already stretch plausibility and our capacity to believe? If a horror film delivers the scares and administers them in an effective manner, what does it really matter if the movie is based on fact or something purported to be true? Unfortunately for The Quiet Ones it only bears a vapor-like resemblance to the "real story" and it doesn't really frighten at all. What it does do is take up screen time with the cliches most horror films can't shake and a story that doesn't bear much logical scrutiny or sense.

An Oxford University psychology Professor named Joseph Coupland (Jared Harris) is convinced supernatural claims can be explained as mental projections and is determined to prove his theory. When we see him in his Oxford classroom, his students become agitated over an argument on the supernatural. The students seem less Oxford material than suburban community college enrollees with British accents. One can't imagine a university of international renown like Oxford allowing a professor or class to waste time discussing the supernatural but there it is onscreen.

Coupland recruits three students to help him in his research. We learn that the subjects Coupland has filmed have had strange, frightening experiences with the supernatural and one of them; a young woman named Jane Harper (Olivia Cooke), has had her share of disturbing, unexplained brushes with the weird which Coupland insists can be readily explained by his theory. The woman has been in and out of asylums and shows no signs of improving. Coupland believes that if he can prompt Jane to project what is tormenting her, he can capture the "energy" and expel it, thus ridding her of her psychic torments.

Documenting the experiment on film is a young, naive student named Brian McNeil (Sam Claflin) who has a yen for camera work. His camera allows the movie to shift point-of-view from first person to third, mimicking the Paranormal Activity hand-held perspective horror fans have come to know.

As the experiment begins, Brian learns Jane must be locked up to protect Coupland and his staff from her violent episodes. How a professor and three students could allow their subject to be locked up in spartan coditions, sans bed, proper clothes and comforts is disturbing. Jane is treated very much like a wild animal then coerced into summoning someone she calls Evie, a sinister entity she believes lives inside of her.

Before long, Coupland's experiment comes to the attention of the Oxford administration, who inform the professor his work can't continue on school property, thereby making the experiment's relocation an imperative.

Coupland, students and Jane find themselves in a large, house in a rural area. How they can afford the place wasn't clear to me but it is abandoned, cold, creepy-looking and shabby inside. It isn't long before the weird and frightening "thing" inside Jane begins to emerge through a series of experiments that look strangely like those employed in The Exorcist II; one of them involves a strobe-like device similiar to the one Richard Burton sat before in the silly Exorcist sequel. A homage?

Coupland remains doggedly determined to explain Jane's problems with rational, scientific arguments--kudos to the professor--but he adheres stubbornly to reason even when it becomes abundantly clear something just might be inside Jane. One such proof is an ectoplasmic "thing" that is discharged from her mouth. As the students become frustrated with the professor's methods and his obsession to cure Jane, it comes to light that a little boy, also suffering mental torments and seen earlier in films in Coupland's class, was the Professor's son; one he couldn't save from a condition similiar to Jane's.

As the days pass, Brian begins to fall in love with Jane and realizes she should be receiving professional care in an institution. While investigating strange, self-inflicted markings Jane has made on her legs with a bobby-pin, Brian discovers said markings are actually a symbol representing a 5000-year-old Sumerian demon whose name we never learn. Brian's sleuthing also uncovers Jane's story. We learn she came to the attention of a cult who worshipped said demon and who believe her to be a conduit for the evil entity.

All comes to a head the night Brian decides to rescue Jane from Coupland's experiment. The demon comes home to roost, unleashing mayhem and death; thereby ruining the professor and student's semester.

How does Coupland have ample time and funds for the experiment, which seems to devour all his time? Doesn't an Oxford University professor have to grade papers, write books, read academic journals, or pursue other areas of his professional and private life? At least the students mention walking away from the experiment and salvaging the semester.

The film never fully creates the dread and visceral fear we want from a horror story. Pogue confuses loud, startling sounds for a sustained atmosphere of gut-churning fear. The demon never truly threatens; instead he acts more like a disgruntled teenager hoping to incur his parent's wrath by making a racket. And do we need to see one more horror film where the protagonist discovers a symbol seen on a body or wall is that of a demon from some ancient, mythical lore?

Over the final credits, we see what are supposed to be photos of those who participated in the real-life experiment but they looked suspiciously phony. I learned the photos are indeed fake at a website called History vs Hollywood. The people are supposed to represent the characters in the film though I can't figure the filmmaker's reason for including them.

Too bad the Sumerian demon didn't demand script revisions or make an appearance himself; the movie could have used alot of both.