Its Cinema - not Realism.

We aren't going to movies for realism, we go to escape, to travel to new worlds, or see this one differently, but to create the "Cinema Reality" the filmmaker is asking the audience to join,  it is a tough line to tread. The more outrageous the world in which the audience is being asked to join, the more it mus follow the rules that we know. So it becomes much more difficult when creating a "Reality of Cinema" when dealing with the world we all know and experience, and are only asking the audience to make a small jump. I can accept ghosts, although I've never seen one, but the rest of the film that isn't "ghostly" has to be consistent with the real world I know, or I just won't accept this "Cinema Reality"

So I'm getting into horror films, hey I'm working on the screenplay for one, and I'm noticing a few things as I watch them on Netflix on demand. Many Many Many of them aren't good (suck is actually the word I was going to use.) Some aren't bad, but they fail for various reasons.
Seance - watched it, and problem, problem, problem. Really it looked like some film school students had a set for a few weeks. It was completely lacking in "realism." I'm not a fan of "realism" in the Cinema - but this wasn't an attempt at realism, it was just immature inexperienced filmmaking. Now if it was a bunch of neo, my hat is off to them. The script needed more work, editing was not innovative, and shot selection to heighten drama, emotion, or to add the necessary info to convey the story wasn't there. The lighting, the art direction - not even close. Some things to note - if your film is set in a building with 20 stories or more and the hallways have concrete floors - then all the rooms have concrete floors, and there is no way that a little kid who died would be able to put a cookie tin filled with under a linoleum floor in the bathroom. Unless the little kid got a jackhammer out and dug out some cement, then laid linoleum back over it - let me tell you, if you have a spec of dust under linoleum, it will bubble and you will get a hole in about a month. Plus when our heroin cuts through the linoleum, there is a light shinning on the cookie tin. So okay, it isn't realistic, but the thing is - as a filmmaker,  you and your team have to create a reality - it is like a dream you are crafting and asking others to join in. But it has to be established and consistent within itself and what people know - because people watching your film aren't asleep - or at least you hope not. It is like Fellini said in the making of "Satyricon" when the characters pull a dead cow from the water and the cow twitches. The doctor that anesthetized the cow said in real life dead cows twitch and Fellini says "It's a movie - if the cow twitches it's alive" or something like that. You are creating a sharable dream - Cinema not Realism. It must contain the building blocks of reality, it must look "real" while being fake. When the realism - or the fact that what is being represented as real intrudes as fake, the audience is lost.

We all see it, we all know when it happens, and we are snapped out of the reverie of our shared dream. Even "Bicycle Thief" created it's own cinematic feel and sense of realism (watching a black and white film helps here.)

So down this road think of "Death of a Ghost Hunter." Not a bad idea, but then we bring in a -video cameraman- to document the paranormal examination. Now this was handled really badly, because we are watching the movie 10 minutes before the video guy makes an appearance, and when he does, it was without his camera, and the "ghost hunter" continues her endless self dictation, but m instant question was - to whom exactly is she rambling? It isn't voice over, it is the character talking to herself, as if to someone else. SO does she have her own personal cameraman that no one is paying attention to? It breaks the cinema - and does it really badly. It's a style, the camera persons point of view, and it works, but it works when it is consistent within its own rules. Failing to establish rules, a clear understanding of how the film will be shot and presented ends up with a mishmash of techniques that miss the mark and don't stimulate, or move your audience. You can break the rules, of course, but first you have to establish them.

It's a craft, it takes time, and attention, and some innately do it better than others. That's a gift, or their talent.