We'll be curious to see if "Chronicle" is affected by Paramount's found footage middle finger to audiences everywhere, "The Devil Inside." As you'll remember, that film had the dubious distinction of both topping the box office while also earning the enmity of audiences (it earned a rare F CinemaScore) thanks to its controversial ending which literally told cinemagoers to go to a website. Seriously. But really, any rational person could have figured out that "The Devil Inside" looked like a turd months before it opened — really, how many exorcism movies do we need? — but the opposite is true for "Chronicle."
Yes, it utilizes the same found footage aesthetic used by every half rate scare movie these days, but whereas those look like tired retreads, here it looks actually refreshing, engaging and fun. The campaign for the movie is beginning to start moving in bigger strides with two more lengthy clips arriving and our only hope is that we don't see all the best parts of the movie before it opens. Anyway, the concept for the Josh Trank directed movie is quite simple. A group of teenage dudes discover they have superpowers, but find their friendship strained when darker forces come into play. A good job has been done to keep exactly what happens under wraps (and again, we hope this is for a genuine surprise, and not a cheap cop-out).
The clips here intrigue, with the first (via HeyUGuys) show the two dudes having a bit of fun with their abilities and the second going into some more tense territory as they explore a deep, dark hole in the ground. It's effective stuff, and the cast of mostly unknowns (including the rising Dane DeHaan who will star in both "The Wettest County" and "The Place Beyond The Pines" this year) seem to be having just as much fun as their characters.
We'll see if this pays off when it opens on February 3rd.
