I'll tell you why so serious

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Clever and entertaining enough to recommend even to members of the 1%

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Oculus was creepy and unnerving. It is a little over 30 minutes, it takes place entirely in a single, undecorated room, and is almost entirely performed by a single actor. A man locks himself in a room with a large decorative mirror. He has several recording devices set up to document what will happen. He turns the cameras on and begins explaining what led to this "experiment." It turns out that the mirror has a history of causing violent death in every place that it has hung, including the narrator's own home. His father and mother were among the mirror's victims, and now he wants to document its effects. By shutting himself up in the room and recording what happens, he intends to prove the mirror is cursed.In Oculus, there are very few special effects supplementing the performance. Yet, it builds incredibly well towards a tense, satisfying conclusion. For much of the film, the mirror actually stays covered up by a white sheet, but even without much happening visually, the film still creates and builds a tense atmosphere. I consider this short film to be one of the more effective entries in its genre.

What can i say, i love the Twilight Zone style shorts (and i'd say this was akin to that sort of sci-fi /horror) but this has got to be one of the most affecting short films that i've ever seen without it having to lower itself to the reliance of gore and visual explicitness.Simply a gruelling and incredibly paranoid half hour. Shot on an obviously low budget with minimal casting and mininimal locations (i.e. one room) it achieves maximum tension and maximum freakishness without actually being overtly freaky. A completely different viewing experience from what the ordinary filmic audience is used to.The acting was superb from the main character and my only quarm with the entire production is the last few seconds could have been a little more in the same vein and less showy (not in an f/x sense but more in a well,was it him or was it the mirror? Regardless,it's one of the most (not terrifying, but i think psychologically draining would be an accurate summary) nightmarish shorts you're likely to see.Check it out now!!!! A+

How horror should be.I was fortunate enough to view this prior to The Call of Cthulhu at the Leeds Film Festival in 2006 and to be honest, Oculus was better.Goes to show that you don't need masses of blood and gore and elaborate sets to produce chilling horror.I found myself holding my breath on more than one occasion as well as looking for a non-existent cushion to hide behind!That's how good it is!The acting was brilliant and it was really well written - the story will appeal to any fan that loves a spine-chiller.Looking forward to other instalments and hoping to get this on DVD someday.

We saw this short at the DragonCon Film Festival in Atlanta. This is a great brooding short that builds. The creep factor is very high, and it's heightened by the fact that we can see what's happening, but the main character can't.I thought the beeping alarm clocks were a little too loud and therefore a little irritating, but I'm guessing that was the desired effect. This also could have been due to the sound at the venue where we saw it. It wasn't a great room for movies, acoustic-wise.The make-up was very good, and the special effects were nice and creepy. Kudos to the team that created this, and we are looking forward to more installations!