Blu-ray Review: Possession (2009)

July 22, 2020

Written by DanXIII

Daniel XIII; the result of an arcane ritual involving a King Diamond album, a box of Count Chocula, and a copy of Swank magazine, is a screenwriter, director, producer, actor, artist, and reviewer of fright flicks…Who hates ya baby?

Newlyweds Jessica (Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar) and Ryan (Michael Landes) are diggin’ on being hitched, but there’s a snag… they share their home with Ryan’s psychopathic, ex-con brother Roman (Guardian of the Galaxy‘s Lee Pace), which is a stressful sitch in-fuckin’-deed…

Long story short; Roman ends up hitting his brother with a car, and the two sibs end up balls deep in Comaland; population: them. Anyhow, Roman wakes up, Ryan does not… but here’s the fun part; Roman now claims he is Ryan.

Now our heroine isn’t exactly ready to swallow that plate of what appears to be gourmet bullshit… but, Roman knows shit only Ryan could, ya dig? This eventually leads her to believe that whopper may indeed be the truth… but is it… is it?

Well, Possession looks slicker than shit through a duck’s ass, that’s for sure. Directors Simon Sandquist and Joe Bergvall have a keen eye… four in fact, and they know how to get the most out of fog-enshrouded exteriors, cold hospital rooms, and deep shadows that could be hiding menace… and they definitely have a firm grasp on the color wheel… but all that visual panache can’t cover up some real problems with this picture.

One of the aforementioned snags is the fact that our leads Gellar and Pace really have  ahard time clicking, and the lack of chemistry makes everyone seem like they are sleep walking a bit, which is a downer considering that the duo are strong actors.

Along with that, the pace here is rather leaden and the whole mystery of how Ryan got in Roman’s body… and if he actually did, loses major steam as the narrative (provided by screenwriter Michael Petroni, and based on the South Korean film Addicted) just sort of hobbles around, doin’ it’s own thing.

Along with all you see above, this Blu-ray release from MVD Entertainment does include an extra or two, with a behind the scenes featurette, a collection of deleted scenes, and the film’s trailer being the options.

Possession sure looks great, but overall the story will more than likely leave you cold… even if the mystery at hand is intriguing on the surface, if not in the execution.

 

 

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