Real or Memorex?

Ten Bulletpoints re: Oculus 1) This is probably from The Exorcist, but where I remember it from is Hysterical: one priest telling another not to listen, that the devil will lie to you. But then one of the Hudson brother’s pants are actually at his ankles. It wasn’t a lie, surprise. If you could turn that into a feature-length movie—and you can—then you’ve got Oculus, pretty much. 2) Horror lately is really getting good at making its ghost-women kind of legit-creepy, yes? I thought Mama made its ghost-woman about as scary as could be—just visually disturbing, and moving something like that ghost-girl from Stir of Echoes—but this Pennywise-eyed ghost-lady in Oculus, she’s Mama‘s cousin, I’d say. Or maybe they’re all taking from Legion, what with the CGI-jaws kind of dropping inhumanly low? Not sure. But it works, and in the same way the Grays from X-Files did: by stranding us between recognition and revulsion. That face has all the same features, but it’s wrong, too, isn’t it? Isn’t it? 3) Mirrors are to horror as peanut-butter is to chocolate. First time a mirror in  horror really got to me, I suppose, was Skeleton Key. But this mirror in Oculus, it’s more like the Erised Harry gets entranced by in The Sorceror’s Stone, yes? Or maybe a horror reference will be more on-point: Supernatural 1.19, the one with the haunted painting with a ba-ad history. But, tempting as it would be, Oculus never becomes an episode. It stays a feature—possibly a first installment, but still, the story’s  . . . → → →