Imaginary

Film: Imaginary

Year: 2024

Director: Jeff Wadlow

Writers: Greg Erb, Jason Oremland and Jeff Wadlow

Starring: DeWanda Wise, Taegen Burns and Pyper Braun

Review:

This is a movie that was on my most anticipated for 2024. My interest did wane when I saw that this was a Blumhouse. It didn’t help that there were mixed reviews, most leaning negatively. Now being PG-13 isn’t the biggest issue for me, but knowing that it is Blumhouse, they tend to not necessarily work for what I enjoy. I still did go to the theater to see this opening weekend.

Synopsis: a woman returns to her childhood home to discover that the imaginary friend she left behind is real and unhappy that she abandoned him.

We start this with a woman being chased down a corridor of doors by what looks like a monster. She wakes up in bed and it is through this that we learn it is a nightmare. Our lead is Jessica (DeWanda Wise). She is married to Max (Tom Payne). He is divorced due to his wife having a mental break. We do see her briefly and she is Samantha (Alix Angelis). He comes with two daughters. The older one is Taylor (Teagen Burns), who dislikes her new stepmother. The younger one gives her a chance, Alice (Pyper Braun).

Jessica is dealing with these nightmares so Max suggests that they move faster than they planned. They’re going to Jessica’s childhood home since her father now resides in a retirement community. What is interesting there is that she doesn’t have the best memories there so it seems odd that moving into this house would help. Regardless, they do.

We get an interesting scene where Jessica and Alice are connecting, but Taylor puts a stop to it. Jessica takes her room growing up to be her studio. She is an artist for children’s books about a millipede that is chased by a spider. The spider scares Alice who we see has burn scars on her arm. There is a dark reason here that her mother did it. Moving does help with Jessica’s nightmares. There is a teen guy who lives nearby, Liam (Matthew Sato), who Taylor is attracted to. Alice also meets a new imaginary friend, Chauncey.

At first, Jessica and Max think it is cute that Alice believes so much in Chauncey. A neighbor, Gloria (Betty Buckley), was Jessica’s babysitter and reminds her that she had an imaginary friend while living here. Interestingly, his name was also Chauncey. Concern grows when this entity wants to play a dark scavenger hunt with Alice. The reward also could tear this family apart.

That is where I’ll leave my recap and introduction to the characters. Where I want to start is that we have great concepts behind this. I like the idea of imaginary friends being real and entities that only children can see. That is creepy. There are ones who are benevolent, just there to be friendly while the one we have in this movie has a nefarious plan. I like that it is set up that this happens across cultures. It is also an interesting idea to play with that Jessica had the same one that Alice is now interacting with as well.

Now that is a good overview to set up what this movie is doing. There is depth added here that Jessica was taken from her father to be raised by her grandparents. She doesn’t remember this. She does have scars on her forearm though. I do find it slightly problematic that she wants to move back to the house that she lived in until she was five, knowing that she was taken from her father. Alice and even a bit of Taylor have a shared experience that their mother went crazy. Alice has burns on her forearm. Shared trauma is something that you can bond over. Even more so that Chauncey capitalize on it with both.

Another aspect that I like is that Jessica grew up to draw and paint these stories. We know from her introduction of her studio to Alice that she was into art growing up. I like this as it shows that Chauncey targeted her creativity. This also allows Jessica to piece things together when Alice disappears. It helps to fill in back-story that she also played this scavenger hunt game as well.

Despite all these good things, I had problems here. The first is that this movie is too long. My interest waned after the opening act. What is crazy there is that we have Alice in peril so I should be there, especially since I have a daughter. After that introduction though, it just took a long time to the stinger for me which involves Dr. Soto (Veronica Falcón). There is a reveal there that hooked me back in. The problem then from there is that I again lose interest. This also plays with the idea that we don’t know what a ‘dream’ is and what is real. I’m not always a fan here. I do think it is good to mess with the characters’ heads, but it just felt a bit too convenient from there and playing with the ending lost me. I don’t hate this though. I did want to say that.

Where I’ll then go will be with filmmaking since I’ve covered the pacing. I like what they do with perspective so I’ll credit the cinematography. We get to see something that might not be real with Chauncey. That was cool and then showed us the truth. This also goes to the other side where this entity is from. The best part there is an effect done when the monster is mimicking people. That is terrifying, credit for that. I don’t know if they utilized the other side well enough though. They are supposed to be playing with perspective. We needed a bit more of that. The effects were fine. There is CGI here that isn’t great. The practical effects were also fine. There are things done where we see the entity hiding where characters don’t notice that is creepy. The use of the sound design made me uncomfortable so I credit that. The soundtrack other than that was fine for what was needed.

All that is left then is acting. I thought that Wise was good as our lead. I like that she’s in this awkward position of being a stepmother. Alice is young enough to entertain the idea where she has battles with Taylor. Burns has pretty eyes and plays this insufferable teen well. It is clinched but I get why it is here. Braun is good as this little girl who is the target of the entity. I do like that Buckley is used here as a link to Jessica’s childhood and the present. She has also done research since then to fill information. Payne works as the father, but to be honest, he disappears from this. Other than that, I thought Falcón, Samuel Salary, Sato and the rest of the cast were fine to round this out for what was needed.

In conclusion, this movie is doing good things. We have a creepy concept and the back-story works for me. The problem is that this takes too long in between what works so my interest wanes. The acting was solid though with Wise, Burns and Braun leading the way. I think that this is made well enough aside from the length, pacing and some of CGI effects. There are creepy things done here though with visuals and soundtrack. I even was creeped out that we know the entity is in the room even if the characters don’t. This falls short though, which is a shame. I still don’t think it is as bad as some people are saying.

My Rating: 6 out of 10