The idea is scary. The trailers were scary. Some of the moments in the film are a little scary. Overall though, yeah, not so much with the scary. I was curious to see White Noise since I did think the trailers were intriguing but it ended up being a disappointment. It’s such a shame when a film starts with a decent idea and just fails so completely.
Released in 2005 and directed by Geoffrey Sachs, the film is about architect Jonathan Rivers (Michael Keaton) who loses his wife Anna when she accidentally drowns. Shortly after her death he begins to receive messages from her when listening to “white noise” or static: static on radios, on his answering machine, on televisions. Raymond, a man who has also received messages from Anna, contacts him but at first Jonathan refuses to listen. Jonathan eventually visits Raymond and becomes obsessed with listening for messages from his wife. The plot gets a little complicated from here and basically, without giving away spoilers, Jonathan makes contact with some very nasty, malevolent spirits. He finds that they are up to something sinister and he must stop them before it’s too late and more people die.
Now I have a few problems with this film. One is with the plot. It’s an interesting premise with a lot of potential for a very frightening, suspenseful film. However, the direction that they take it is just silly. It tries to be something like Gothika or What Lies Beneath or even The Sixth Sense (to name some relatively recent examples): a ghost story that goes in a direction you may not expect it to go. In White Noise though, it just doesn’t work. I think it has a lot to do with how they go about revealing what is going on. The pacing is slow and by the time anything really starts to happen I’m already bored.
I think a lot of it has to do with the characters. I found Jonathan to be really annoying. Michael Keaton is trying to play grief stricken and he’s not awful but he’s not great either. Overall I would call his performance bland. It’s frustrating to watch this guy. In your typical horror film, people frequently do pretty dumb things. As the hero of White Noise, Jonathan is no different. He quickly gets in way over his head but he never seems to even realize that fact. He’s willfully oblivious, ignoring all of the warnings he gets, ignoring everything except for the hints of messages from his wife. I spent a large part of the movie being really irritated with how stupid he is.
The relationships in the film aren’t very well developed. We’re told that Jonathan and Anna were in love but I never got much of a feel for it. Jonathan’s relationship with his son is almost non-existent. Again, we’re told that he cares but we’re never given any real evidence. It’s a problem throughout the film, we keep being told things but we’re never shown them, we’re never made to believe.
While the acting doesn’t help with any of that, I think what it really comes down to is Niall Johnson’s script. It’s bad! The character development is dreadful. I never really got a feel for motivations beyond grief over a loved one’s death. Or if there are hints at other motives, they are really weak. I don’t buy the level of obsession in relation to the brief messages that Jonathan receives. And while the plot is developing and Jonathan is coming to conclusions, it feels like a lot of the logic is just too big of a leap based on the information we are given. Beyond that, based on what the rules of the film’s universe are being established as, a lot of what happens just does not make sense. Things happen, there seem to be rules that these things follow, and then all of a sudden those rules are gone and different things start to happen. The way that things work out doesn’t seem to be very plausible.
I also have to say, I hate the special effects. They are so incredibly cheesy. I hate all of the stupid static televisions. The static in general gets to be really grating after a while. I know it’s a movie about hearing things in the static but there had to be better ways to execute the idea.
I did have an idea not to expect too much when I saw the film was rated PG-13. Almost all of the PG-13 horror flicks, especially ones released in the last five years or so, are terrible. Given the subject matter White Noise isn't a film for the young and impressionable but it's not overly vulgar or gorey either. I actually don't think there really is any gore at all. So it's a film that probably won't be found to be offensive.
I waited to see White Noise because I heard it was bad. I ended up catching it on HBO and I’m just grateful that I didn’t pay anything to watch it. I’m glad that my curiosity has finally been satisfied but I really did not need to see this film. I definitely recommend that you avoid it. It’s not scary, it’s nonsensical, and I just plain did not care about anything or anyone in it.
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