You'd think at some point they'd figure out that by saying a supernatural horror is "based on true events" doesn't actually make a movie any scarier. It was a tactic that worked perfectly well back in the days of The Amityville Horror but this is a totally different time, and people are too savvy(or maybe cynical is a better word?) and smart to buy into the thought of some evil poltergeist ratting the silverware and slamming cabinet doors as a real thing. We don't need to be told "Hey, this is real!" for a movie to make us feel like it could happen. Yet every single time we get another exorcism or haunted house flick, you can bet on it beginning with those words: 'based on true events".
The trailer for The Apparition takes a slightly different tract, but its goal is exactly the same. The film is indeed based on the supposedly real university experiment that set out to prove the supernatural can be brought into existence through the power of thought. That if we simply believe in them strong enough, spirits and ghosts can be brought into reality. The eager(read: moronic) group of scientists succeed all too well, and unleash the forces into the world, where they proceed to terrorize a young couple played Ashley Greene(Twilight) and Sebastian Stan(Captain America: The First Avenger). Tom Felton(Harry Potter), who is so much better than this, co-stars as the friend who knows more about the supernatural than anybody should. Todd Lincoln wrote and directed the film, and to me it just looks like a completely generic thriller best left to $5 DVD bins. I could be wrong, but the trailer doesn't hold a lot of promise. Why anybody would think that adding scientific formulas and reasoning to a horror movie would be effective is beyond me. The Apparition is set to open on August 24th....
