Imaginary – Review

Cert – 15, Run-time – 1 hour 44 minutes, Director – Jeff Wadlow

Writer and illustrator Jessica (DeWanda Wise) gets inspiration from her youngest step-daughter Alice’s (Pyper Braun) relationship with imaginary friend Chauncey, however Chauncey may be more real than anyone thinks, especially in Jessica’s past.

Over the last year or two a number of horror films, particularly under Blumhouse, have tried to get under the viral marketing campaign of creating an iconic new horror villain. The kind which can start social media trends that bring flocks of audiences in to the latest frightener with the edge of enjoying the antagonist at hand. Imaginary is no different as, after an initial teaser trailer encouraging us to use our imaginations to see the horror at hand, slightly dirty teddy bear Chauncey became the centre of attention. Put at the fore of posters and made a key detail of social media marketing the stuffed toy was seemingly being used to draw audiences in like an inanimate main character.

It comes as something of a relief that Imaginary, therefore, doesn’t put Chauncey centre stage and instead makes the imaginary friend of young girl Alice (Pyper Braun) seem like a standard threat or villain to face once he’s creeped the central family at hand out enough. The family are led by Alice’s step-mum Jessica (DeWanda Wise). Having moved back to her childhood home, alongside Alice, musician husband Max (Tom Payne) and teenage step-daughter Taylor (Taegen Burns), potentially sinister details of Jessica’s past, which she seems to have forgotten apart from details arising in dreams, begin to arise, and Chauncey may be part of them. As things develop the bear grows a bigger role in the narrative and eventually starts to feel like a threat designed for social media engagement and ‘most iconic horror villains we couldn’t get enough of’ ranking lists over anything else.

While perhaps lacking in overall scares there’s some intrigue to be found in the developments at hand as things build-up for the family. There are some good ideas scattered throughout as mysterious goings on begin to unfold for the group, while Jessica tries her best to form a connection with her step-daughters – finding it much more difficult with Taylor than Alice – but as we delve into Jessica’s relationship with her childhood home things begin to feel lacklustre and overfamiliar. The film plays into safe territory in regards to its developments and holds itself back from having any of the imagination it wants you to believe is present in the characters, despite good performances from the central cast.

Yet, in the real world there are occasional saving graces to help try and lift things up. When delving into the possibly supernatural, and exploring more of Chauncey and his world things devolve into true blandness. Nowhere more so than in the third act where not only do characters seem to randomly change for no reason but events are drawn out with little reason to further stop you from caring about the characters who could otherwise be leading an interesting restrained chiller.

Yet, the more ambitious it tries to be the more lacking Imaginary seems to become as it distances itself from its characters to delve into a world that it doesn’t seem familiar with itself. Lacking the push that it needs for attempted scares to have any effect. What starts out with intrigue and a likable enough nature soon turns into a boring and distancing piece of work that seems to forget the engaging nature of the, albeit conventional, human relationships at hand in exchange for flat dark fantasies.

Imaginary starts off with promise as human dramas are set out for the well-performed central characters, however as imaginary friend Chauncey is delved into more upfront things fall flat as horror and dark fantasies fall flat, not helped by a strong feeling of familiarity.