Lights Out

Lights Out is a tiny jewel which more horror fans should know about. It's extremely simple and does nothing surprisingly well, but the fact that it's 3 minutes and so simple but still evokes that feel of horror is impressive to say the least. It deals with the "darkness brings evil" aspect many horror movies touch bases with at one point in the film; so there's nothing special about the idea behind Lights Out, it's the execution and cinematography. The cinematography is above average but also nothing incredible, the camera angles work and some are pretty clever and do a damn good job with the suspense, but is it something I've never seen before? No.

Where Lights Out shines is the mood, atmosphere, and emotion, and just how quickly is establishes it all (in under 2 minutes), and how it goes out with a bang. I'm not a fan of jump scares, I think they're typically very cheap ways to get some cheap short-lasting scares out of your audience and I have quite the aversion to their uncreativity. But the couple jump scares Lights Out uses I'm actually okay with because of how well executed they were. And when I say I'm glad a film had a jump scare in it, you know it must be special.

The feeling of dread, familiarity, sympathy, inevitability, and atmosphere was so well established within these 3 minutes, it makes me wish Lights Out was more well known by fellow horror fans.

Lights out(2013)is a short horror film that is about a young woman who is just about to go to bed when suddenly she starts seeing a unusual entity that only appears when she turns on the lights,this woman hides in her bed for about 2 minutes and nothing is there,she thinks shes safe and is about to turn of her lamp when she sees a monster of a creature crouched down on its knees with pupiless eyes and gives a horrifying scream as the lamp switches off and the creature probably kills her. Lights came out the day before new years eve. It became so famous it got 13,015,454 views on YouTube and it was even more famous a American film produced by James Wan was released in theaters. I loved this short horror,I got so scared at the end I just loved it,Lights out 2 will come out at one point,the year is unknown.

At first sigh, nothing new. same thrill, chill and game of light as source of fear/tension. and the familiar end. but the film has a virtue who is unfair to ignore - Lotta Losten. after you see the short films of Sandberg, she becomes one of presence real impressive. for the image of ordinary woman, silent in many situations, innocent alwayys, front to different unusual challenges. result - a form of portrait of Sandberg art , present in few short films but giving to his wife the right role who becomes, after a walk across short films, axis of a fresh universe of horror.

Lights Out (2013)

*** (out of 4)

Effective horror short from David F. Sandberg would be the bases for his feature length version from 2016. Basically a woman walks into her apartment and when she turns the lights off she sees a figure. When she turns the lights back on it's gone. Each time she turns the lights off the figure reappears. Obviously the suspense comes from the director building up how much closer the figure gets to the woman and for the most part this worked quite well. It clocks in at less than three minutes so the film obviously doesn't run along too long but it certainly makes an impression and especially the ending. Horror fans should enjoy this.

A woman is about to go to bed when she notices something very weird and more than a little disturbing: whenever she turns out the hallway light, she can see the silhouette of a figure standing at the end of the hall, but when she turns the light back on, there is no-one there. The final time she turns out the light, the freaky figure has moved a lot closer. Taking no chances, the woman tapes the switch in the on position and gets into bed, but is terrified to hear strange noises in the hallway, and to see the light go out…

There's no shortage of horror shorts on YouTube that use their brief running time to creep out the viewer before attempting to give them a coronary; Lights Out uses this well-worn format (providing not one, but two potential heart attack moments), but still proves very effective thanks to skillful direction by David F. Sandberg, who wrings every last ounce of possible tension from his tale, and a great central performance from the actress playing the unfortunate victim of the supernatural creature. Lights Out might be predictable stuff—one knows full well how the film is going to end—but it does its job well, effortlessly scaring the bejeezuz out of the viewer as expected.

7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for making my work colleague almost soil himself with fright. The big wuss!