Disc Reviews
White Noise 2: The Light | DVD Review
“…a satisfyingly atmospheric thriller…that easily surpasses the original”.
What do you get when you take a genuinely creepy scenario, add in some fantastic acting performances and decent special effects and call it a sequel to 2005’s mediocre yet hugely profitable Michael Keaton vehicle White Noise? Oddly enough, all you get is a pretty good straight-to-video thriller that easily surpasses the original, but will end up forgotten on video store shelves after a few weeks.
White Noise 2 very quickly and very wisely distances itself from the E.V.P. (Electronic Voice Phenomena) premise of the original and jacks it up a notch with the tale of Abe Dale (the criminally underrated Nathan Fillion, 2005’s Serenity, 2006’s Slither), whose wife and son are senselessly murdered in front of him. Wracked by guilt and unbearably saddened by the loss of all that he holds dear, Abe tries to commit suicide but instead goes through a near-death experience after which he has the ability to see who is going to die based on the glow of their aura. He soon realizes that using this “gift” to help save people – and thus messing with the natural order of things – has horrible consequences and he must race against time to avoid another catastrophe. Along the way he meets – and saves – Sherry Clarke (Katee Sackhoff, Starbuck from the acclaimed Battlestar Galactica TV series) a nurse who falls for him and quite aggressively tries to make him fall for her. The two actors play very well off each other and are easily the high point of the film. While all of this may sound very frenetic, the plot moves along at an almost glacial pace. Somehow, though, this works. There aren’t too many action sequences to speak of, as most of the story is focused on Abe’s slow realization of what has happened to him and what will happen if he doesn’t do anything about it. It’s a nice change of pace from what moviegoers are used to, making for a satisfyingly atmospheric thriller.
The script, as written by newcomer Matt Venne (whose only other writing credit is an episode of Masters of Horror), does have a few small holes in it, and Venne makes a wholly unnecessary religious connection in drawing the parallel between Abe’s situation and that of the angel Lucifer, who was cast out of heaven for disturbing God’s order of life and death. Director Patrick Lussier (Dracula 2000, The Prophecy 3: The Ascent) does an admirable job of keeping the viewers on the edge of their seats without resorting to cheap scare tactics. He uses the lighting and dreary weather in Vancouver to convey Abe’s initial sense of hopelessness and eventual sense of dread. He almost messes up completely early on with the laughable sequence of Abe’s near-death experience, but if you hold out long enough to get through it, chances are you’ll forgive it, and that’s largely thanks to Nathan Fillion’s nuanced performance as the burdened Abe.
The film looks and sounds as good as can be expected, delivering a few well-timed frights with eerie sounds and music coming from all directions if you’re set up with a 5.1 Surround Sound system. Aside from approximately 30 minutes of deleted, extended, and alternate scenes that add nothing to the film, the DVD release of White Noise 2 includes three extra features, two of which are actually quite interesting:
Exploring the Near-Death Experience is a mini-documentary featuring six people who’ve had near-death experiences recounting their stories, including how their lives have changed since these episodes. Cheesy musical overdub aside, it’s a fascinating account of this well-documented but under-exposed phenomenon.
The Making of White Noise 2 is a rather pedestrian and too-short featurette that doesn’t go into much detail about the making of the film, except for a few comments about the story and how Venne and Lussier wanted to work the religious angle into the film.
Journey Into Madness, in which the affable and charming Fillion takes us on a tour of the reputedly haunted abandoned insane asylum in Vancouver where much of the filming took place, is a humorous vignette with a twist ending that will have viewers wondering whether it was scripted or if it was a practical joke at Fillion’s expense.
By no stretch of the imagination is White Noise 2 to be considered a classic thriller. But by forgoing (for the most part) cheap scares and coupling a decent script with some fine acting performances, Lussier has crafted an enjoyable film that is a worthy weekend rental.