I admit, this is not a great film, and in many eyes it may not even be a good one. There are a variety of characters who have brief appearances with no explanation of why they are there or what their specific roles are. For example, there is a doctor played by Ron Rifkin who has a couple of scenes that Bell's Mattie bounces thoughts off of, but his relationship to events is unclear, and his possible demise glossed over, I guess to just get him off the screen. Then there is the still unclear, but clearly strained, relationship between Mattie and her mother, glimpsed at in a couple of phone messages. Others float in and out of the periphery as well.
What really caught me up was the feeling of no escape. Once the virus gets out and people start dying, there is no escape. That feeling, and the resulting atmosphere, make understanding the root causes unnecessary. The idea of being trapped - that no matter what you do, you are doomed - is the most palpable feeling to be gotten from Pulse. In that respect it is not like your typical film where you have a hero or heroine who will save the day at the end; the best you can hope is to merely survive, as there is no way of stopping what is to come.
Sure the film has a familiar structure, but the way it plays out was not typical. The ending actually reminded me of Escape from LA, another entertaining if not terribly high quality movie. It, too, had a theme of humanity's reliance on technology.
Kristen Bell really anchors this film. Whatever flaws the movie has, she is able to give it that center. She ably plays all the required emotions, and is just a wonderful young actress. She has great charisma and likeability, she can play to a wide range, and this is a mere glimpse into her future potential. The rest of the cast has some recognizable actors, but aren't nearly up to the task as well as Bell was.
Article comments
1 - Iloz Zoc
Superb review. You hit the nail on the head about the characterizations that float in and out. Less would have tightened up the storyline. I did find the washouts used, with green, blue and flourescent white to be really annoying after awile. I was looking for a thematic reason to using the particular color, but it seemed to get mixed up half-way through, which may have been due to the meddling during post-production.
I am puzzled that this film didn't go to R. More flexibility with the R would have allowed more exposition, which might have explained a little bit more and pumped up the atmosphere.
The bit with the washing machine was pretty goofy. Visually okay, but...why come out of a washing machine?
There's quite a Lovecraftianesque feeling to the storyline. My gut feeling is that the J-horror original has more atmosphere. I've got to dig it out too.
2 - Steve C.
I thought this film was something of a misfire, personally. The telegraphed shock scenes disrupted the atmosphere Sonzero was trying to build, all attempts at explanation were weak and stripping out the thematics of Kurosawa's original just reveals how stupid the story actually is. It's better than it could have been, though -- the mere idea of Craven helming this causes me to blanche.
3 - adam
This film was dissapointing,
the storyline relied on the viewer dying to know what the cause/reason for the ghost/virus or even what they were, when the film finished with just a verbal warning towards the unknown dangers of wifi, frequencies ect, i felt very let down.