Filmmaker Steven Soderbergh has long been interested in experimenting with form. Using an iPhone to shoot movies like “Unsane” and “High Flying Bird;” recutting “Raiders of the Lost Ark” to be a black and white silent film; putting Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho” alongside Gus Van Sant’s 1998 remake to create a new film, aptly titled “Psychos;” whatever the equipment, whatever the experiment, Soderbergh has probably done it – or at least thought about doing it.
In my mind, all of these experiments lead to one clear, albeit seemingly obvious, conclusion – that form truly does matter when it comes to how the audience experiences a cinematic story. Dialogue is important, performance is important, music is important, of course; but the shooting style and camerawork in a film has the potential to fundamentally shift our interpretation of story more so than most anything.
While some of his experiments might be more successful than others, the way in which Soderbergh decides to tell these stories matters as much as the story itself. And with “Presence,” he reaches new heights in proving that cinematic form is inextricably linked to the emotions of the audience. With “Presence,” Soderbergh uses the camera to unsettle us, make us empathize, make us hate – all culminating in an ending that rips the floor out from underneath your feet.
“Presence” is a ghost story, and its premise is quite similar to many other ghost stories: a family moves into a new house and becomes increasingly aware that they’re not its only occupants. But the difference here is that the audience is aware of the ghostly presence before the family even shows up. From the very beginning of “Presence” through to its end, the audience lives in the perspective of the ghost.
The beginning of the film sets up that premise as the ghost (and therefore, the audience) travel through the bare rooms of the home where we’ll be spending the entirety of the film’s run time. Soderbergh (who also serves as cinematographer for the film, which was shot on a digital, single-lens camera) not only familiarizes you with the house in that short time, but also effectively teaches you how to watch the movie. The ghost moves through the house in a long, continuous shot – the first of many – taking in the view from spots where they can see as much of each room as possible. The camera quickly develops a visual language that lends personality and feeling to the presence. You can almost feel the vibration and dread when the ghost is angry, feel the confusion and sadness when they retreat back into the closet – a hiding place associated with fear suddenly takes on one of melancholy.
The ghost doesn’t seem to know why they’ve been relegated to this home anymore so than the audience does. There’s no real menace to the presence, at least not all the time, and so the real horror becomes the family drama the ghost observes. This is a house divided into factions: Rebecca (Lucy Liu), the mother, adores her son Tyler (Eddy Maday). He’s popular and charming, a swimmer who should have no trouble making friends at his new school. On the other hand, Chris (Chris Sullivan), the father, worries about his more subdued daughter, Chloe (Callina Liang). She’s the reason they moved – her friend passed away unexpectedly – and Tyler resents her for making him start over in a new place.
The history between this family is striking and clear. Even if we don’t necessarily learn all of the dirty details, everything comes through in performance and blocking. In one scene where the family gathers in the living room at night, Tyler regales his mother with a story about how he and his friends tricked a girl into sending them an inappropriate photo, an objectively horrible tale that Rebecca takes in with the aura of a teenage girl trying to impress a crush. Chloe is disassociating, sinking as far back into the cushions as she can, while Chris, clearly disgusted, downs a glass of wine in between frustrated asides. The script, written by David Koepp, can sometimes feel a little bit clunky, particularly when it comes to the way teenagers speak to each other. But it’s in moments like these where the actors smooth out any of the slightly ragged edges. Sullivan is particularly good as a father watching his daughter come apart at the seams, so gentle and intentional in his bearing that when he explodes, however quietly, it feels monumental. “There is an excellent man inside of you, Tyler,” he softly tells his son during a private moment. “I would love to see him soon.”
There is a separation in this house, and that separation comes to a head as Chloe becomes the first of the family to start to believe in the ghost that haunts their home. The ghost’s experiences – which are filmed in singular long takes with hard cuts to black in between – mostly have to do with Chloe, her connection with the other side more sensitive than the rest of her family members at first. But everything else the ghost witnesses feel seemingly random, bits of family lore and information that don’t ever really coalesce in the usual sense of the word.
When taken as a whole, however, these small vignettes reveal a portrait of a family too wrapped up in their own selves to recognize any sort of presence outside of the realm of the physical, or too weighed down by their grief and sadness to recognize the all-too-real malevolent force that will soon enter their home. While “Presence” isn’t as scary as a traditional horror movie, these vignettes lead to a climax that is as unsettling as any you’ll experience all year – an ending designed not to terrify, but to unmoor.
