Mirrors – Blu-ray Review

By Patrick Luce Jan 17, 2009, 11:36 GMT

Emmy and Golden Globe winner Kiefer Sutherland comes face to face with the ultimate forces of evil in "Mirrors", the deadliest horror film to ever look you in the face. Kiefer stars as a security guard who is exposed to unspeakable acts of evil from the past, present and future only visible to him in the reflection of mirrors. Suddenly, his life is exposed to the evil and he must ...more

Mirrors manages a few creepy moments from time to time, but there isn’t enough to keep the scares throughout the entire film. The movie starts off as a slowly building tension fest, but runs off the rails towards the ending – which feels forced and stupid.

Writer/director Alexandre Aja knows how to take a film and slowly crank up the horror, but he also knows how to push audiences over the edge with the gore factor. With Mirrors, he blends both styles and brings a movie that has all the atmosphere of a classic haunted house story with the gore modern horror audiences seem to crave.

The film stars Kiefer Sutherland as a down on his luck ex-cop named Ben Carson. Carson was once a detective, but a bad shooting has put him on suspension from the force and ruined his marriage.

He has lost his home, his family and is now living with his sister Angela (Amy Smart). His wife Amy (Paula Patton) has pretty much written him off, and he is fighting just to get to spend some time with his two kids.

Hoping to get things started for himself again, Carson takes a job as a night watchman at an old Mayflower department store which suffered from a fire in the 1960s and has yet to be reopened. The previous night watchman died mysteriously (well, he killed himself at the start of the film), and it doesn’t take long for strange things to start catching Carson’s eye.

The store is huge, in decay and filled with mirrors. As Carson patrols at night, he starts to see strange things in the mirrors, and hear screams. It doesn’t take long for the cop in him to start investigating just how the previous night watchman died, and what is behind the mirrors at the store.

The investigation also attracts the “ghost” in the mirrors and sends Carson on the hunt to discover what “Esseker” (which is written on one of the mirrors) means. He also discovers how deadly this investigation is becoming as his family is put in jeopardy by their own reflections (there is a disturbing scene with Amy Smart in the bathtub). 

With his family in danger, Carson heads back to the department store to confront the evil – which is also where the entire movie went lost all the fright that had been building. Aja goes for the big Hollywood action ending, and loses any momentum and scares the picture had managed to build earlier.

While Mirrors was a letdown by the time the credits rolled, I did like several aspects of the film. The idea of something being behind your own reflection in the mirror is creepy, and Aja and company run with this haunting premise. Several scenes in the movie (again the one with Amy Smart or scenes with the small children) are disturbing and can get into your head.

Aja has pushed the limits in past films (such as The Hills Have Eyes remake) so you are not sure how safe these kids will be or if their daddy will show up in time to save them. He also knows how to capture an image on film that will stay with you long after you finish the movie, and Mirrors has several of those moments.

Sutherland does a decent job in the film, but I wish he could move away from the cop-type role. I realize the hit television series 24 is what put him back on the Hollywood map, but in a lot of ways Ben Carson felt like just another version of Jack Bauer. I also didn’t like how easily he makes his way through his investigation, and where that investigation eventually ends (I don’t want to spoil any big reveals).

The Blu-ray version of Mirrors looks great and really shows off the film’s haunting atmosphere. The presentation helps the film be a little scarier – even if the film’s plot kills all the momentum by the ending.

It also features the theatrical cut and the uncut version of the movie. There is about a minute difference in the two versions, and I couldn’t tell you what was different other than some extra gore.

The special features include a look at the connection between mirrors and the supernatural; several deleted scenes which don’t add much to the movie; animated storyboard sequences; and an alternative ending with optional commentary by Aja. 

The Blu-ray also comes equipped with BonusView: Mirror Images – which offers Picture-in-Picture commentary by Aja and Gregory Levasseur (who helped write the screenplay and produced the film), and storyboard-to-scene comparison.

Mirrors was a decent horror film, but I was disappointed by the time the credits rolled. I have enjoyed Aja’s other films (including the remake of The Hills Have Eyes), but was letdown by some aspects of Mirrors’ plot and some of the stiff acting by Sutherland. It is a fun horror film that might get in your head for a bit, but don’t expect too much from the reflection.

Mirrors [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon. Visit the DVD database for more information.