THE BLACK SHEEP is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATH. We're hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. Dig in!
The Possession (2012)
Directed by Ole Bornedal
“The Possession is a pretty damn fine throwback film that enjoys the small moments..”
Ok, so that’s not the plot to the Sam Raimi produced The Possession, but it’s the same idea. Unhappy or cursed souls must find some unsuspecting sap and take "possession" of their bodies in order to live again.
Now this is a subgenre that’s been done over and over to much the same result. Always a little creepy, always quite predictable. It’s an unfair genre actually, considering it begins and ends with a masterpiece in The Exorcist. Every possession film made after it will forever end up compared to it, fair or not. It's just the way it is.
When we do that, well, The Possession doesn’t hold up against the 1973 classic. Few films do.. However, without the old compare/contrast game, The Possession is a pretty damn fine throwback film that enjoys the small moments. It never goes overboard with gore or overdoses on a scare every 30 seconds.
The cast is pretty great with the much unappreciated Jeffrey Dean Morgan in the lead as Clyde, an unexplained wealthy low level college basketball coach (it always amazes me why all characters have to have money. Seriously, he just went through a divorce three months ago yet he still drives a BMW and buys a big bad ass house.) Regardless of his questionable financial status, he’s a great leading man, always in control with a comfortable presence on screen. Maybe I just remember him as the second best thing about The Watchmen, but he deserves more work because he’s better than most of the dudes on screen.