Part toy, part hoax, part occult tool, the Ouija has a unique place in popular culture. Popularized in the Western world by American spiritualist Pearl Cullan circa WWI as a tool to contact the dead, the witchboard or talking board became a cultural phenomenon. As early as 1944, Ouija-style boards were part of horror lore, and they’ve been popping up ever since, whenever you need to have a group of people confronted and killed off by some sort of creeping, ghostly horror. Ouija, though, contains nothing you haven’t seen before. Indeed, the movie is fairly predictable, and the script by director Stiles White and collaborator Juliet Snowden (who also teamed up to write surprisingly good Jewish-themed exorcism tale The Possession) is well-trodden territory. However, the thing that the film has going for it, aside from the impressive scares, is pacing. Horror films typically use rising action, with everything coming to a screaming head in the third act. Ouija is less rising and more constant, a ticking metronome of terror that starts from the cold opening and continues throughout the movie. Rather than rising, the film moves along steadily, somehow being scarier than it should be in the process. The film also makes good use of the planchette’s role in seeing into the spirit realm – it’s a guaranteed jump-scare machine every time, thanks to some good monster makeup and clever staging. Ouija is comfortably familiar for those au fait with the haunted house genre. There’s nothing particularly exciting or noteworthy about it, but that’s fine. Ouija is the rare PG-13 shocker that isn’t secretly an R-rated horror film with its teeth pulled, and there’s plenty of room for that in cinemas this time of year. It’s a familiar tale told well, starring some reasonably likable teenagers (no one to root for dying here), and spiced up by some scary-for-the-rating special effects. It’s Halloween, and this film is a fun-sized candy bar; it has the taste of a big bar, but it’s easier to consume in one sitting without feeling ill. US Correspondent Ron Hogan would never, ever, ever have a witchboard, Ouija board, talking board, spiritual conduit, creepy doll, or ventriloquist dummy anywhere near his house. Find more by Ron daily at Shaktronics and PopFi.