Mirror, Mirror, On The Wall, What's The Most Boring Movie Of All????????????????????????

                                  I just love stories, where children murder their parents, because, ninety per cent of the time, the parents deserve it, with the exception of Nancy Kelly as Christine Penmark in "The Bad Seed."  She was faultless; I would rather have seen fat, annoying, garrulous Aunt Monica (the brilliant Evelyn Varden) go flying off the roof!

                                   Annalise Basso and Garrett Ryan, as the young Kaylie and Tim Russell, in "Occulus," give the best performances in the film.  When the director tells them to ratch up the terror, they are completely convincing.   As are Rory Cochrane and Katee Sackhoff, as the deranged (or eventually so) parents, Alan and Marie, who deserve to have gunshot blasted through both their heads.

                                     The parents are killed.  Did the children do it?  And did they have a reason????

                                     Unfortunately, the movie cross cuts between the kids, when they are grown.  As adults in their twenties, Karen Gillan and Brenton Thwaites (who is Prince Phillip in the current, and better "Maleficent") play grown Kaylie and Tim.  Gillan starts on an interesting note, but speaks her lines too fast, especially in what is the film's most interesting segment--a monologue she delivers in front of a video camera, detailing the horrific history of a mirror that has come to be owned by her family, which has victimized all its owners.  She eventually descends to the level of a boring, strident bitch, while Brenton Thwaites looks on with the kind of boredom indicating he would rather be somewhere else.

                                      I don't blame him.  "Occulus" is supposedly about a mirror possessed of a supernatural force that drives its owners to madness, murder, or suicide.  It is no 'Snow White,' there is no Wicked Queen, and, let me tell you, the mirror in that Disney classic gave a much better performance; you saw things  in it, and it talked!!!!!!!!!  Here, no effort is made to convey a supernatural presence, short of a few props falling, which could have been accidentally done by a crew member on set.

                                     If the movie had just stayed with the children, and the questionable murder of their parents, and the deserving thereof, "Occulus" might have reached the potential it had, and was striving for.  Instead, it is an overlong, boring mess.

                                       Where  is Donna McKechnie when needed?  After all, no one did more for mirrors than she!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!