Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		1.5

Jessabelle Blu-ray Movie Review

Re: No 911 call could save this mess.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 11, 2015

Okay, I guess it’s time for a new “horror film rule” to be enforced. It already goes without saying that it’s unwise to have illicit carnal relations in the woods, especially if there’s a machete wielding madman lurking nearby, and it’s similarly a given that only a fool (a horror film trope, to be sure) would go into a dark room in an isolated house where he or she has heard an odd sound. So with memories of films like The Ring resonating through the air, let’s all just agree that anyone who starts playing old videotapes in a horror film is—well, a fool. Jessabelle utilizes that by now hoary cliché, even giving it a suitable retro spin by having the “culprit” be actual VHS era media, while also attempting to infuse the film with a certain Southern Gothic ambience. The film has a few spooky moments, but lapses fairly regularly into near self-parody in its depiction of a newly paralyzed woman making her way through a cache of forbidden videotapes while she attempts to come to terms both with her condition as well as her history. Buoyed somewhat by a good performance by lead actress Sarah Snook as Jessie Laurent, a young woman whose left is rent asunder in a horrifying accident that kills her fiancé and leaves her consigned to a wheelchair. Forced to reunite with her estranged father Leon (David Andrews), a curt curmudgeon with a drinking problem. More or less isolated at her family’s dilapidated Louisiana farm, Jessie turns to entertaining herself via old videotapes which seem to offer her a glimpse of her long dead mother who supposedly died shortly after giving birth to Jessie.

There are hints of an intriguing mystery buried beneath the general ridiculousness of Jessabelle, with Jessie’s exploration of the videotapes seeming to open a kind of portal where her long deceased mother Kate (Joelle Clark) seems to be reaching out and talking directly to her now grown daughter. A series of initially baffling messages seems to suggest that Kate is somehow in communion with Jessie, able to communicate through the intermittent tracking problems and pixellated distortions of a decades old videotape. It’s actually here in these apparently mundane but still foreboding sequences that Jessabelle manages to work up at least a modicum of unease, in fact much more so than in the film’s patently cliché ridden use of jump cuts, menacing spirits and sonic thuds inserted into the film for no other reason than to evoke a startle response.

Some alert credits readers may be downright shocked that Jessabelle was written by Ben Garant of Reno 911! fame (as Deputy Travis Junior). With his writing partner Tom Lennon, Garant has also served as the co-writer of lighter weight fare like Night at the Museum 1 & 2, Balls of Fury and probably most saliently Hell Baby. Therefore, it might be tempting to wonder if Jessabelle is supposed to be a parody, albeit one played resolutely straight. There’s unfortunately no such indication, though, and the film wanders through a series of underdeveloped scenes to finally devolve into a Grand Guignol climax that includes that old standby for a lot of films set in the Gothic South, Voodoo.

The film actually does at least a bit better in some of its non-horror approaches, including a rather well done subplot involving Jessie and an erstwhile boyfriend named Preston (Mark Webber), with whom she reunites after moving back to Louisiana, despite the fact that Preston has ostensibly moved on and married someone else. The interplay between these two characters actually manages to anchor the film in some passingly believable human emotion, something that the rest of the film seems to dodge almost willfully.

There is one undeniably spooky thing about Jessabelle—its poster, reproduced on the cover image of the Blu-ray. The creepy ensnaring of Jessie’s hair with that of a ghost provides a suitably chilling depiction of a haunting and perhaps even a possession. Unfortunately that piece of marketing knowhow is never matched by the film itself. There’s probably another “horror film rule” regarding truth in advertising that should be addressed at some future date.

Jessabelle Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Jessabelle is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Shot digitally with the Arri Alexa, the film has the typically sharp if somewhat shallow look typical of the Alexa, with excellent detail and fine detail in close-ups, an approach that director Kevin Greutert and DP Michael Fimognari regularly exploit (as can be seen in many of the screenshots accompanying this review). There's the requisite if admittedly occasional amount of color grading on display here, once again partially in pale blue hues (see screenshots 13 and 14), but detail is only slightly affected, and then typically in more dimly lit interior scenes. When the film ventures out of doors in the bright daylight, detail and fine detail, as well as sharpness and clarity, rise appreciably. Also when not artificially graded, colors look natural and are nicely saturated. There are no issues with image stability and no problematic compression artifacts mar the presentation despite the omnipresence of dark sequences.

Jessabelle Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Jessabelle's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix is full of hackneyed effects, but it also provides near constant immersion as well as a kind of quasi-hallucinatory quality in sequences like the early scene where Jessie is being operated on after her horrific car accident. There's good attention paid to the ambient environmental effects of the Louisiana bayou, and some of the jump cuts provide bursts of LFE that will startle most people. Dialogue is presented very cleanly and clearly and the track offers excellent fidelity, wide dynamic range, and no problems to report.

Jessabelle Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary with Director Kevin Greutert, Writer Robert Ben Garant, and Executive Producer Jerry Jacobs. This was evidently recorded before the film was released (to largely withering reviews), and the three are rather enthused about it finally seeing the light of day after what sounds like a long gestational period. Garant actually deals with the disconnect between his comedy persona and the film in a fairly disarming way, though even he admits he didn't know quite how to approach writing a straight horror entry.


• Jessabelle: Deep in the Bayou (1080p; 9:14) is basically an EPK focusing somewhat on the location, with some interviews with the cast and crew.


• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 7:48)


• Outtakes (1080p; 2:39)


• Extended Ending (1080p; 1:11)

Jessabelle Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There's a decently creepy mood lurking throughout Jessabelle, but the film's reliance on Ring-esque "killer videos" (more or less) is so trite that it undercuts the more realistic ambience that evidently Garant and Greutert were going for. The best thing in the film is the believable performance by the up and coming Snook, who hopefully will graduate to more demanding roles than this year's scream queen. For fans of the film, technical merits are very strong and there are some decent supplements.