Presence
Director Steven Soderbergh and screenwriter David Koepp concoct a pretty solid gimmick for their supernatural thriller—a ghost story designed entirely from the POV of the ghost—but at a certain point the "story" has to be as important as the "ghost," and that story is ... just not very good. It opens with a suburban couple (Lucy Liu and Chris Sullivan) moving with their teenagers Chloe (Callina Liang) and Ty (Eddy Maday) into a new house, with only Chloe initially seeming to sense that it may already have an unseen occupant. Soderbergh makes great use of his prowling camera movements, using every trick in his book to convey when the silent, observing entity feels curiosity, anxiety or anger while rarely feeling obliged to indulge the audience with jump-scares. That places a burden on the narrative—which hints from the outset at a tragedy Chloe has experienced that might make her more receptive to the presence—to provide some actual stakes, and it becomes a pretty clunky journey. Vague references to some criminal activity Liu's character might have engaged in alternate with the introduction of Ty's new friend (West Mulholland) without ever providing enough substance for the family's growing tension and dysfunction to matter as anything but distractions on the way to whatever payoff is down the road. The result is a pretty solid exercise in style where the substance is as ephemeral and unknowable as the character through whose eyes we've been watching. Available Jan. 24 in theaters. (R)
The Colors Within
One of the fascinating things about anime features is discovering how many different kinds of stories can be told through the medium of animation, ones that American filmmakers almost never bother to try. This coming-of-age tale from director Naoko Yamada and writer Reiko Yoshida follows Totsuko (Sayu Suzukawa/Libby Rue in the English dub), a student at a Catholic boarding school with a unique ability to see what amounts to the "color" of someone's soul. That vaguely supernatural component plays only a tiny part in what follows, however, as Totsuko comes to form a band with Kimi (Akari Takaishi/Kylie McNeill), a former classmate who has dropped out, and Rui (Taisei Kido/Eddy Lee), a boy living on a nearby island. Yamada and the animation team craft delicately beautiful images, ranging from the almost watercolor perspective of how Totsuko sees the world, to reflections in a Newton's cradle Kimi uses as a metronome. Most significantly, this isn't some rollicking fantasy adventure, but simply a narrative about young people wrestling with what it feels like when the person you want to be might disappoint those closest to you—and that's even if you don't happen to agree that Totsuko's fascination with Kimi is gay-coded. The result is slow, patient storytelling—perhaps occasionally to a fault—about fundamental life journeys, one where the way the characters are beautifully drawn, in both senses of the word. Available Jan. 24 in theaters. (NR)
Brave the Dark
It wouldn't be accurate to describe this fact-based drama as an "inspirational teacher" movie, since it really doesn't traffic in the most familiar tropes of that specific genre. Yet it still feels like something that's going through the motions of inspiration rather than aiming for real emotional impact. It opens in 1986 Pennsylvania, where 17-year-old Nate Williams (Nicholas Hamilton) is living out of his car and facing jail time for burglary. To the rescure comes high-school drama teacher Stan Deen (Jared Harris), who becomes determined to give Nate a home and hope after a lifetime of tragedy. That tragedy gets trickled out until the very end of the movie, including an unnecessary double-dip of showing us the crucial traumatizing event and then having Nate describe it, apparently so Hamilton can get a showy monologue. Director Damian Harris (Jared's big brother) does allow the relationship between Nate and Stan to emerge naturally, with both central performances providing a solid anchor, and an interesting character study of Stan simply as the kind of generous soul who connects with everyone. It's just too bad that it often feels like a feel-good machine delivering a lesson about no one ever being a lost cause—a perfectly wonderful idea in principle, but one that's about good intentions more than it is about good filmmaking. Available Jan. 24 in theaters. (PG-13)