Chronicle

It's hard to find movies with original ideas. Producers like to place safe bets, so movies are typically made to have a certain amount of familiarity with audiences. Sometimes, though, a movie comes along that takes a couple of those reused ideas and creates something that is more than the sum of its parts. Chronicle takes the video-camera point of view made popular by The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield, and Paranormal Activity and matches it up with the superhero genre to make a movie that feels simultaneously familiar and fresh.

Despite the fresh take on the superhero genre, the rest of the movie is pretty mediocre. The special effects are pretty good, and the acting is decent, but a lot of my grievances with the movie come from the story. I know that ideas are used and reused, but this story is painfully predictable. I don't want to give anything away, but if you've ever seen a movie (or, more commonly, children's superhero cartoons) where the villain is a bullied kid who gains superpowers, then you know exactly where this movie is going to go after the first ten minutes.

The saving grace is that the movie is still really fun to watch. The video camera POV gets a fresh update from other movies that you've seen, the actors all give solid performances, and the special effects are really top notch. Had they made the plot a little better, this would be a really great movie. As it stands, though, the cliche-ridden script chains the movie down to mediocrity. I give it 6 silly telekinetic pranks out of 10.