Chronicle

My husband has been buzzing in my ear for the last few weeks that he wanted to see this.

Here’s the synopsis:

Three high school students make an incredible discovery, leading to their developing uncanny powers beyond their understanding. As they learn to control their abilities and use them to their advantage, their lives start to spin out of control, and their darker sides begin to take over.


I’ll do my best to leave out any major spoilers, but I almost think revealing the ending would be justifiable if it prevented even one person from spending money to go see this.

(I tend to exaggerate, but let’s just say that it’s never a good sign when you find yourself wanting the hero to fail and you haven’t even eaten past the butter drenched, top layer of popcorn.)  And to be fair, my husband did say he liked it. It's not bad enough to merit a one star review, but I can't get over how bored I felt while watching it.

The teaser you’ve just read is about all that you get plot-wise. I think the director was trying to do some sort of a inner conflict type character-journey-story, but it’s one of those things where if I had to write an essay about it for an English class, there’d be more B.S. than toner.

Walking out of the theater I was in a stupor, sort of like when I walked out of “Suckerpunch”. Except quality wise, Chronicle felt  like an amateur film festival project whereas Suckerpunch at least had visual appeal to make up for its plot deficiencies.

I turned to my husband and asked, “What was the point of watching that?” He has yet to provide me with any form of detailed answer regarding plot, characterization, graphics, or audio track to justify why he likes it. His reluctance to defend his opinion is something I don’t mind publicly calling “odd”.  Usually when he knows he’s right about something, he’ll be incredibly stubborn or insistent on proving his point.

And now, a bit of sarcasm: 

Three high school students make an incredible discovery,

'Incredible'? More like low-budget. Oooh, a dark scary hole in the ground. And everything is being shot in first person POV so there's more screen shots of the wall and ceiling than anything super-cool.

For the record: I think films shot through the first person POV are obnoxious. It’s like the director is just looking for an easy excuse to use cheap film and lousy camera angles. 

By the time the director got done setting up the back story for the hero's character journey, I was  hoping the discovery would be a bunch of aliens that would kill them instantly. When the screen went dark, I wouldn't have felt cheated if that had been the end of the movie.


leading to their developing uncanny powers beyond their understanding.

The most uncanny thing about this was why it never occurred to them to seek a medical review after the incident, or why they waited three weeks to return to the site of the “artifact” after they discovered they could do awesome things like levitate Legos.  Well, what do you know, the hole in the ground caved in. Guess that’s the end of that adventure.

As they learn to control their abilities and use them to their advantage,

Yes, telekinetically powering on a leaf blower to flip up girls’ skirts, and showing off in the school talent show, is exactly the sort of thing extra-terrestrial magic powers should be used for.  I did laugh a few times, but this wasn’t supposed to be a comedy.

their lives start to spin out of control, and their darker sides begin to take over.

In all fairness, only one of the characters had their life spin out of control, and that same character was the only one to have his dark side take over. If anyone can explain what drove the MC to go all Meyer Wolfsheim without a transition phase, I'd love to hear your interpretation.

Until then, I'm calling it weak script writing, and if I ever meet the producer, I'm taking his Phoenix University degree and beating him over the head with it.