By Thomas M. Puhr.

If the synopsis sounds familiar, then you’ve probably seen It Follows (2014). Don’t Look Away acknowledges this indebtedness… but this grating self-awareness relies far too heavily on its influences.”

A haunted mannequin stalks a group of dimwitted twentysomethings in Micheal Bafaro’s Don’t Look Away (2023). Once you lay eyes on the strange figure, you’re as good as dead. Fail to heed the title’s advice, and it vanishes into thin air (usually to reappear right behind you). Anyone with whom you come in contact suffers a similar fate. If this synopsis sounds familiar, then you’ve probably seen David Robert Mitchell’s instant classic It Follows (2014). Don’t Look Away acknowledges this indebtedness – a character actually says “it follows” – but this grating self-awareness relies far too heavily on its influences.

The mannequin begins its reign of terror after a gang of robbers unwittingly unleashes it from the mirror-lined box in which it has been trapped. The first victim caught in its sight is Frankie (newcomer Kelly Bastard: a better name, in fact, for a final girl), a law student with a lot on her plate: the impending LSAT; her ingratiating and pretentious boyfriend, Steve (Colm Hill); and the recent deaths of her parents (this family history is mentioned once and quickly forgotten). What follows are a number of shots in which the mannequin stands behind a foregrounded Frankie as she investigates creaking floorboards, thumps behind her closet door, etc.

These opening scenes are silly and fun, and some of Bafaro’s wide-angle shots of the figure lingering in a fog-enshrouded park or deserted road can be quite arresting; the director has clearly studied up on his John Carpenter (the film is dedicated in part to him). And the mannequin itself is a small feat of production design. With its sexless torso, long limbs, and incongruously detailed face (wide smile, sunken eyes), it makes for an effectively simple villain, one made all the creepier in that we never see it actually move. For its first half hour, Don’t Look Away has the makings of an enjoyable, albeit derivative, slasher.

Unfortunately, an avalanche of cloying references to other films you’d rather be watching undercuts these meager offerings. Take an early sequence in which Frankie attempts to forget her woes by going to a rave with her friend, the appropriately-named Molly (Vanessa Nostbakken). When her tormentor starts appearing in the club (one humorous shot shows it standing behind the DJ booth), she makes a run for the bathroom as echoing voices tauntingly repeat “They’re all gonna laugh at you!” In case we didn’t get the Carrie (1976) shoutout, Bafaro emphasizes Frankie’s blood-soaked face after all of the partiers are slaughtered (never mind that, despite being the sole survivor of such massacres, Frankie never seems to be under any police investigation).

Most egregious, though, is a bizarre subplot involving Steve’s degeneration (presumably under the plastic figure’s spell) into a Jack Torrance-esque psychopath. Multiple lines from The Shining (1980) (“Do you have the slightest idea what a moral and ethical principle is?”; “I love you more than anything else in the whole world, and I’d never do anything to hurt you”) are quoted nearly verbatim. We even get scenes of Steve rambling to an imagined bartender and recalling a dream in which he cuts his girlfriend “into little pieces.” When Frankie takes a peek at Steve’s PhD thesis, she finds that he has just written “mannequin” over and over (though since we’re in the digital age, maybe he just copied and pasted). Lord, I wish I were kidding.

These allusions are so transparent – so far beyond the bounds of tasteful homage – that I wondered briefly if Bafaro and co-writer Michael Mitton were trying to make some sort of commentary on contemporary horror cinema’s inability to “look away” from its influences’ daunting shadows; but a goofy final act (Bafaro appears as the eccentric, milk-eyed man who first boxed up the mannequin) doesn’t really bear out my pet theory. At their worst, these scenes have the look and feel of lazy fan fiction. And can’t we all agree that winking nods to The Shining have long been done to death? Can we at least find a new classic to plunder?

The most unfortunate side effect of Steve’s antics is that they shift the focus away from Don’t Look Away’s strongest character: Frankie, who becomes a likeably earnest protagonist in Bastard’s hands. A forbidden romance she has with an old friend, Jonah (Mitton), could have provided something approximating a genuine emotional core, but it isn’t given the time or attention it needs to be anything more than yet another glossed-over plot point. Bastard really gets short changed here. I hope she gets the opportunity to be in a better horror film one day.

Thomas Puhr lives in Chicago, where he teaches English and language arts. A regular contributor to Bright Lights Film Journal, he has published “‘Mysterious Appearances’ in Jonathan Glazer’s Identity Trilogy: Sexy BeastBirth and Under the Skin” in issue 15.2 of Film International. His book Fate in Film: A Deterministic Approach to Cinema is available from Wallflower Press.

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