Steven Soderbergh is a celebrated filmmaker, recognized for movies including Erin Brokovich, Traffic, and his debut Sex, Lies, and Videotape. Never afraid to push boundaries, the director is now bringing his unique perspective to the 2025 movie calendar with his upcoming horror movie Presence. Starring Lucy Liu, Julia Fox and Chris Sullivan, Presence is finally hitting theaters on January 24 — a full year after it began garnering attention from its premiere at Sundance and other film festivals. Let’s see what critics are saying about Soderbergh’s supernatural thriller.
Told from the perspective of the entity that inhabits the home of the Payne family, Presence is apparently so intense that some audience members walked out of its film festival premiere, and even the cast was reportedly left shaken. CinemaBlend’s Corey Chichizola had the opportunity to see the film, and he says Presence puts a spin on POV horror that he never knew he needed. He writes:
The ending of Presence is truly moving. The story is expertly crafted, allowing the audience and the characters of the film to really earn its final moments. And it proved that POV horror and found footage still has the potential to make a big impact.
Lindsey Bahr of the AP gives the movie 3 out of 4 stars, saying as director and cinematographer, Steven Soderbergh really IS the ghost, and he weaves quite the “chillingly effective tale” that packs an unexpected punch. Bahr says:
It’s a slow-burn experience that sneaks up on you, especially once you’ve seen how it plays out. Personally, I didn’t see any of it coming and couldn’t have anticipated the emotional wallop it would pack in the end. It’s a heady experiment that transcends the somewhat gimmicky-on-paper premise — something Soderbergh manages to do alarmingly well and regularly.
Jesse Hassenger of AV Club gives it a B+, likening the movie to the Paranormal Activity franchise with a twist. The new spin on found footage horror is worth every penny of the ticket price, the critic says, writing:
It’s a Paranormal Activity movie turned inside-out: Rather than a largely stationary camera capturing flickers of spooky but eerily realistic movement in the frame, the camera remains mobile and hovering, its ghostliness an invisible but driving force. Like the Paranormal films, there is an element of surveillance: The camera travels through rooms unnoticed, overhearing bits of conversation and observing actions kept secret from other characters. It’s at once omniscient and deeply subjective. There’s also another technical challenge on hand for Soderbergh, who has professed far more affinity for the cut than the epically long take: to stay true to his POV gimmick, most scenes are staged in single unbroken shots. Cuts move forward in time, not within a scene.
Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times rates Presence 3 out of 4 stars, positing that it was such an interesting story that it would have even worked without the ghost. The dysfunctional family provides the drama, and honestly the horror too. Roeper continues:
Presence does have a few effective jump scares, including one goosebump-inducing moment late in the story, but the more we get to know the ghost — and I know that sounds weird, but we do feel like we come to know him/her/it/they/them — the more we feel a sense of empathy for this being. Like the Beast in Beauty and the Beast or the Phantom of the Opera, this ghost seems to be a kind of tragic antihero, trapped in this house, suspended in some sort of in-between world, bearing witness to a modern American family that should be grateful for all the gifts life has given them but is falling apart at the seams. That’s the real horror of Presence.
While many critics are buying into Steven Soderbergh’s POV, Nerds of Color’s Mike Manalo says the familiar dysfunctional family story drags down the director’s attempts to liven up the trope of having a dead protagonist. Manalo applauds its diverse cast, though, and admits the movie is still worth seeing. The critic gives Presence an A for representation but a C+ for entertainment, writing:
Overall, it’s nice that there’s a haunted house movie, shot in the first-person POV, centered on a mixed Asian American family. Presence is an entertaining enough 90-minute family drama with strong performances from a POC cast (and Sullivan). However, it’s also a cliched and forgettable 90-minute family drama, with twists and a central concept that (despite the innovative nature of how it was filmed) we’ve seen far too many times. I wouldn’t exactly put it high on my must-see list for this year. However, I’m happy that a film like this exists, at least for representation purposes.
The critics have lots of interesting takes on the upcoming haunted house movie, but overall they seem to agree that Steven Soderbergh’s POV is one worth checking out. On Rotten Tomatoes, it’s been Certified Fresh with 88% on the Tomatometer, so if you want to see what this movie is all about — and what had people walking out of theaters on the festival circuit — Presence hits theaters on Friday, January 24.
