TRUTH OR DARE
US, 2018, 100 minutes, Colour.
Lucy Hale, Tyler Posey, Violett Beane, Sophia Ali, Landon Liboiron, Nolan Gerard Funk, Sam Lerner, Hayden Szeto.
Directed by Jeff Wardlow.
How to review this film? Probably the best way is to respond to the challenge of the title, truth or dare. In this scenario, those who tell the truth generally benefit. Those who dare are asked to do something impossible and/or immoral and suffer the consequences.
So. One of the truths is that this film is geared towards a young adult audience. The main characters are all in their final year at college, going on their Spring Break. It is the 20 plus or minus age group that is the target for the marketing of Truth or Dare. Perhaps those a little older may think it reminds them too much of their past and they would be happy to forget aspects of it. For those even older, the film may seem even younger!.
This is one of those horror films that emerge in rather great numbers every year. There is usually a group of young men and young women, a mysterious character, and they are asked to be involved in something that they normally would avoid – in this case to play a game of Truth or Dare while visiting the ruins of a mission in Mexico. Not a good sign.
In fact, the writers of the screenplay have enjoyed themselves with a whole lot of hocus-pocus. It claims that diabolical entities which can be called up – in this case, Mexican evil entities – can possess not only people but objects and ideas. This time the evil spirit is possessing the game of Truth or Dare.
And, there is a religious dimension to the hocus-pocus. The setting is a Catholic mission set up in the 19th century. There has been something of a massacre in the mid-1960s – where a group of young women had become novices in a religious order and were under the guidance of the local priest (seen only in a photograph and then his face fading from the photograph) who was something of a sexual predator. The spirit was called up so that people might be freed but, in fact, the spirit possesses the game and, from game to game, a player is possessed and continues to find friends who might be able to liberate them – all for them to be in turn possessed and destroyed.
Which means that the group on spring break, having a somewhat wild time drinking, dancing, flirting, are persuaded by their very serious friend, Olivia (Lucy Hale) to respond to the invitation of a mysterious young man to play the game.
Some rather blunt truth is told, and the game follows them home or, perhaps, more realistically, has taken possession of them. What happens is that those who tend to tell the Truth continue to survive whereas those who try the Dare initiative die, gruesomely.
This raises even more tensions amongst the group, their trying to work together, overcome some disastrous truths which are revealed, contact a woman who had been part of the game and whom the audience has seen setting fire to a woman in a supermarket at the beginning of the film. They talk with the police. They also track down one of the original novices from the Mexican mission – who had called up the spirit, cut out her tongue in order to eliminate the presence of the spirit, has a formula for incantation by which the spirit can return from whence it came.
Needless to say, it doesn’t quite work out that way which is part of the entertainment value of this kind of horror exercise. Who will survive? Will anyone survive? Is the spirit still possessing the game somewhere or other in California?
1. The popularity of this kind of small-budget horror film, for young adults?
2. The California settings? Campus, apartments, the open road, border with Mexico? The Mexican settings, clubs, the ruins of the mission? The musical score?
3. The title, the game, the consequences of telling the Truth, the consequences for Dare?
4. Olivia as the central character, working hard, real estate sales? Markie and their friendship, persuading her to go for the spring break holiday? Reluctant? Gathering the other friends? Final year at college? Prospects for the future?
5. Going to Mexico, the night out? Olivia, reticent, the encounter with Carter? His persuading her to get her friends to go to the mission, play the game? His warning her against it?
6. The range of characters: Tyson, truth about his signing prescriptions, wealthy and arrogant? His relationship with Penelope? Markie, her relationship with Lucas? Olivia telling the truth about her fidelity? Brad, closeted, his friends knowing his orientation? Ronnie, obnoxious, intruding?
7. The game, those choosing Truth, those choosing Dare? Truths being told? Carter and his disappearance? The return home?
8. The premise that the evil spirit inhabited games and ideas? Possessing all the characters? The confrontations in real life, the distorted grin on the faces of the questioners? Truth or Dare? Ronnie, the Dare, dancing, falling off the table, his death? The phones and the confirmation of his death? Tyson, the interview, dressed up, the interviewer and her distorted face, his lies, his being impaled? The others being too late to save him? Their concern, their own experiences of truth or dare, Olivia and her relationship with Lucas? The Dare to have sex with him, the attempt, the revelation that he loved Markie?
9. Markie, her infidelity exposed, her anger? The phone images of her father, his death? Olivia finally telling her that she had visited her father, his approaches, his death? Markie’s reaction?
10. Penelope, Tyson dead, on the roof, Lucas trying to rescue, holding the mattress, her fall?
11. Brad, coming out to his father, his being dead, getting the gun to get his father to beg forgiveness, Brad being shot?
12. Tracking down the information about the mission, the novice nuns, the massacre in 1968, Inez as the survivor? Finding her, her tongue cut out, the notes? The formula to send back the Demon, another tongue being cut out? The background of the priest, sexual predator, the photo and his disappearing from the photo?
13. The opening sequence, the woman setting fire to the other woman in the supermarket? Tracking her down, the interview with her, the information, her death?
14. The role of the police, telling the truth, concealing the information?
15. Going back to Mexico, tracking down Carter, his real name, Sam? His explanations?
16. Markie going with them, Lucas, Olivia? The confrontations, the Demon, fights, urging Carter to cut his tongue?
17. The irony of the Demon still possessing them, Markie confronting Olivia, Lucas slitting his throat? The Demon living on – for the games and victims?
