Mirrors (film)
Encyclopedia
Mirrors is a 2008 horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...

 directed by Alexandre Aja
Alexandre Aja
Alexandre Aja is a French film director who rose to international stardom for his 2003 horror film Haute Tension .-Personal life:...

, and stars Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland is an English-born Canadian actor, producer and director, best known for his portrayal of Jack Bauer on the Fox thriller drama series 24 for which he has won an Emmy Award , a Golden Globe award , two Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Satellite...

. The film was first titled Into the Mirror, but the name was later changed to Mirrors. Filming began on May 1, 2007, and it was released in American theaters on August 15, 2008.

The film was originally scripted as a remake of the 2003 South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

n horror film Into the Mirror
Into the Mirror
Into the Mirror is a 2003 South Korean horror film about a series of grisly deaths in a department store, all involving mirrors, and the troubled detective who investigates them. It was the debut film of director Kim Sung-ho....

which is rated PG. However, once Aja was brought on board and read the script, he was dissatisfied with the particulars of the original film's story. He decided to retain the original film's basic idea involving mirror
Mirror
A mirror is an object that reflects light or sound in a way that preserves much of its original quality prior to its contact with the mirror. Some mirrors also filter out some wavelengths, while preserving other wavelengths in the reflection...

s, and to incorporate a few of its scenes, but otherwise crafted a new story and script for his version of the movie. Mirrors is the first Aja film to achieve an R rating without the need for scenes to be cut.

Plot

The film begins with a security guard running through a subway station. The guard eventually enters a room he cannot escape from and starts begging his reflection in a mirror for his life. Suddenly, his reflection cuts its throat with a mirror shard, killing the "real" security guard.

Ben Carson (Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland is an English-born Canadian actor, producer and director, best known for his portrayal of Jack Bauer on the Fox thriller drama series 24 for which he has won an Emmy Award , a Golden Globe award , two Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Satellite...

), a suspended police detective, begins his first day as a night security guard at the Mayflower, a luxury department store that has been gutted by fire and shuttered for close to a decade. The building still contains numerous mirrors from the store.

On Ben’s first night of patrol he sees an open door in a mirror's reflection while it is actually closed. Over time, Ben begins to see more intense visions, which he initially shrugs off as hallucinations. He soon finds the wallet of Gary Lewis, the previous night guard (who died at the beginning of the film). Inside is a note that says "Esseker". After viewing Gary’s crime photos Ben is convinced that the mirrors are actually making people do things to themselves that they are not actually doing.

Meanwhile, Ben’s sister, Angela (Amy Smart
Amy Smart
Amy Lysle Smart is an American television and film actress and former fashion model.-Early life:Smart was born in Topanga, California. Her mother, Judy Lysle , worked at a museum, and her father, John Boden Smart, was a salesman...

) is killed by her reflection as it grips its jaw and begins to slowly pull its mouth apart, causing her to bleed profusely. Ben is deeply distraught when he finds her body. In anger, he attempts to destroy the mirrors at the Mayflower, but they are impervious to damage. He demands to know what the mirrors want, and cracks appear on one of the mirrors, spelling out the word "ESSEKER".

Ben enters the flooded basement of the Mayflower and finds a small sign stating "Psychiatric Studies" and “St. Matthew's Hospital" underneath. He moves to the site of the leak and begins pulling at the tiles and brick of the wall and finds a room with a chair surrounded by mirrors beyond it, a Psychomanteum
Psychomanteum
A psychomanteum is a mirrored room, specially set up to communicate with the spiritual realm...

. He asks his police friend Larry (Jason Flemyng
Jason Flemyng
Jason Iain Flemyng is an English actor. He is known for his film work, which has included roles in British films such as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch , both for Guy Ritchie, as well as Hollywood productions such as Rob Roy along with the Alan Moore comic book adaptations From...

) to help him locate the patient-employee manifest for the hospital and Larry finds the name Anna Esseker, a patient of the psychiatric hospital. She was twelve years old at the time she died in a mass suicide.

Ben looks through Anna's file, and finds an Authorization and Consent form that negated her Death Certificate, stating that she had been discharged from the hospital two days before the suicide and is led to believe that Anna is still alive. Meanwhile, Ben’s wife Amy (Paula Patton
Paula Patton
Paula Maxine Patton is an American actress. She is mostly known for her appearances in the films Idlewild , Déjà Vu , Mirrors , Swing Vote , Precious , Just Wright , and Jumping the Broom .-Early life and career:Patton was born in Los Angeles, to Joyce , a European-American...

) discovers her son Michael's (Cameron Boyce) reflection acting differently than the real Michael. She calls Ben in a panic, who immediately returns home. Together they cover every reflective surface in the house.

Ben locates Anna Esseker's childhood home, and discovers that she was violent and uncontrollable as a child, diagnosed with severe schizophrenia
Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by a disintegration of thought processes and of emotional responsiveness. It most commonly manifests itself as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions, or disorganized speech and thinking, and it is accompanied by significant social...

. She was taken by a doctor from St. Matthew’s Hospital. His treatment was to confine Anna to a chair surrounded by mirrors, believing this would cure what he believed to be a rare personality disorder by forcing her to confront her own reflection. Ben is told by her brother that when she returned, apparently cured, strange things started to happen with the mirrors in their home. As a result they sent her to a convent, Saint Augustine's Monastery, where mirrors are forbidden.

Ben visits the convent, and finds Anna (Mary Beth Peil
Mary Beth Peil
Mary Beth Peil is an American actress and singer.-Early life:Born in Davenport, Iowa in 1940, Peil trained as an opera singer at Northwestern University under Lotte Lehmann. There she became a member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority...

), who explains that she was actually possessed by a demon
Demon
call - 1347 531 7769 for more infoIn Ancient Near Eastern religions as well as in the Abrahamic traditions, including ancient and medieval Christian demonology, a demon is considered an "unclean spirit" which may cause demonic possession, to be addressed with an act of exorcism...

, which was drawn from her and became trapped in the mirrors. She explains that it collects the souls of those it kills and if she were to return it would make it possible for the demon to be brought back into the mortal world. She refuses to go back.

Meanwhile, Amy discovers that Michael is missing at home and a thin reflective layer of water is completely covering the floor. After putting her daughter in a safe closet, she finds Michael using a chef knife to scrape the paint from the mirrors. Amy tries to coerce him but he escapes, obviously possessed
Demonic possession
Demonic possession is held by many belief systems to be the control of an individual by a malevolent supernatural being. Descriptions of demonic possessions often include erased memories or personalities, convulsions, “fits” and fainting as if one were dying...

.

Having threatened her at gunpoint, Ben returns with Anna to the Mayflower. Anna is then strapped into the chair in the Psychomanteum. Back at Ben's house Michael is suddenly pulled through the water on the floor by his reflection and begins to drown. At the Psychomanteum the lights begin to flicker and the building begins to shake as the demons in the mirrors are released. They repossess Anna and all the mirrors in the Mayflower explode. Simultaneously, Michael is released from the demon's grip and Amy is able to pull him to safety. Ben is then attacked by the repossessed Anna. He manages to kill her igniting a nearby gas line, setting off a huge explosion. The old building collapses, killing the demon, and trapping Ben under the ceiling as he rushes toward the exit.

Ben pulls himself out of the rubble and stumbles his way out of the building. Police and firemen are everywhere in the street, and a body is seen taken in a bag by paramedics, but nobody notices Ben. He looks at the older security guard's name tag, and sees it is written backwards, realizing everything is in reverse (like in a mirror). He comes upon a mirrored surface in the city and fails to see his own reflection as he reaches out to touch it. He realizes that he was crushed to death under the rubble and is now trapped in the mirror world, yet in the living world his hand appears to be a skeleton's on the glass surface.

Score

Javier Navarrete
Javier Navarrete
-Biography:His most famous score, for which he received an Academy Award nomination, was for Pan's Labyrinth . Navarrete also composed the scores for Whore, Tras el cristal, Dot the i, along with various other Spanish films...

 used a prior existing work of classical music, "Asturias" by Isaac Albéniz
Isaac Albéniz
Isaac Manuel Francisco Albéniz y Pascual was a Spanish Catalan pianist and composer best known for his piano works based on folk music idioms .-Life:Born in Camprodon, province of Girona, to Ángel Albéniz and his wife Dolors Pascual, Albéniz...

, as the film's main theme.

Box office

In the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, Mirrors opened in fourth position making $11.1 million. On its second weekend it ranked at seventh position, making a further $5 million. Now, $30 million has been earned in total in the United States. In spite of poor reviews, the film did very well in the box office, especially in foreign cinemas, staying in the top five for its opening weekend in several countries including France
Cinema of France
The Cinema of France comprises the art of film and creative movies made within the nation of France or by French filmmakers abroad.France is the birthplace of cinema and was responsible for many of its early significant contributions. Several important cinematic movements, including the Nouvelle...

, Mexico and United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, where it consistently ranked #2. It topped in the Hong Kong box office with $228,481 and stayed at the third place in Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

 and Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

. In South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

 and Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

 it took #4 for the opening weekend grossing. The film so far has grossed $72,436,439 worldwide including $41,745,000 from foreign cinemas.

Critical reception

The film received generally negative reviews. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...

 reported that 15% of critics gave the film positive reviews based on 67 reviews. Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...

 reported the film had an average score of 35 out of 100, based on 13 reviews.

Sequel

On October 8, 2009, the director Victor Garcia announced that he would begin to shoot a sequel, which would be Direct-to-DVD/Direct-to-video
Direct-to-video
Direct-to-video is a term used to describe a film that has been released to the public on home video formats without being released in film theaters or broadcast on television...

 for 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...

. The sequel was released on October 19, 2010.
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