Presence, Steven Soderbergh’s latest foray into experimental cinema, is an unconventional supernatural thriller that subverts the very idea of a horror film. Told entirely from the perspective of a silent, wandering spirit — the camera itself becoming our ghostly narrator — Presence is less about jump scares and more about slow-burning tension and emotional unrest. In its quietude lies both its power and its pitfall.
Written by veteran screenwriter David Koepp, Presence unfolds inside a single, seemingly average suburban home. The family at the center — Rebecca (Lucy Liu), her husband Chris (Chris Sullivan), and their two teenagers, Tyler (Eddy Maday) and Chloe (Callina Liang) — arrive with baggage both literal and emotional. Rebecca is a driven mother with dreams pinned tightly on Tyler’s swimming career, while Chloe, overlooked and mourning the loss of close friends, drifts in the background. Chris tries to mediate, but his efforts are swallowed by a household on the brink.
Shot in secret and on a modest budget, Presence leans heavily into the formal elegance of its cinematography. Soderbergh, acting as his own DP, positions the audience quite literally in the space of the supernatural. Long, fluid takes allow the viewer — or the ghost — to float room to room, never seen, rarely heard, always watching. The stylistic choice is bold, sometimes hypnotic, but occasionally hinders narrative momentum. While it’s an original conceit, it also leaves the film emotionally distanced, as if the characters are behind glass.
What Presence lacks in traditional horror thrills, it compensates for with layered performances. Lucy Liu commands attention as the overbearing, image-obsessed mother, while Chris Sullivan embodies the weary warmth of a man slowly fraying at the seams. Yet it’s Callina Liang who emerges as the film’s breakout. Her portrayal of Chloe is subtle and aching — a portrait of adolescent grief and invisibility. Her connection to the ghost, or perhaps her understanding of it, serves as the film’s emotional core.
Though the film’s first overt supernatural moment hits with the clumsiness of studio interference — strings swell, an object moves across the room — Soderbergh largely maintains a measured tone. The horror here is existential, the ghost more empathetic than evil. There are questions, of course, left unanswered: Why does the spirit intervene selectively? Why now? But Presence isn’t about resolution. It’s about presence — of memory, of pain, of watching someone suffer and feeling powerless to help.
The screenplay has its stumbles. At times, the dialogue feels inert, functioning more like exposition than conversation. Yet this detachment may be intentional — Soderbergh’s camera captures his characters mid-fall, often without their knowledge. The audience is not just a witness, but a spectral intruder, complicit in the voyeurism.
Thematically, Presence echoes works like David Lowery’s A Ghost Story and Amenábar’s The Others, though it lacks their cohesion. Still, it is commendable for what it attempts: a ghost story less concerned with fear than with emotional fracture. It doesn’t always work, but the attempt is captivating.
Presence is a cerebral, visually inventive take on the haunted house genre. It may not satisfy horror purists or thrill-seekers, but for viewers willing to engage with its quietude and restraint, it offers something rare: a ghost story driven by compassion, not chaos. Flawed but fascinating, it lingers in the mind like an uneasy memory.
CINEMASPICE MOVIE RATING