As a child, Lilly (Valerie Jane Parker ) becomes blind in a car accident which kills her mother, shortly after her father has passed. Raised by her aunt she becomes quite independent and hears voices of dead people, especially children. She doesn't realize she is talking to dead people as the voices are real to her. Madison is the main little girl who she converses with. The film opens with a teaser of Lilly tied down to a table in a dire situation.
The production is told with a vast number of flashbacks as I soon discovered there was only one blind person named Lilly and not two or three. The film is a horror genre, but refrains from the horror we usually see in a film. Has non-denominational religious overtones of souls and reincarnation. Pretty good for a low budget Indie. No weird hollow sound, no confusing camera angles.
Guide: No swearing, sex, or nudity.
Voices
2020
Action / Drama / Horror / Thriller
Voices
2020
Action / Drama / Horror / Thriller
Plot summary
After visiting her father's grave, Lilly and her mother are involved in a terrible car accident leaving Lilly orphaned and unable to see. In her youth, she struggles with her blindness and begins to hear voices. Unbeknownst to her they don't belong to the living. After years of learning to cope, Lilly is now happily married with a baby on the way. Lilly soon discovers her unborn baby has become a vessel a second chance for souls stuck in limbo to be re-born. She only has until the baby's first heartbeat to decide which soul. Now the voices she heard in her youth have returned, clamoring for the chance to come back. Among the voices, she befriends the spirit of a little girl tied to a years-old cold case. Lilly finds herself in a desperate struggle with the girl's murderers and the souls vying to be born again.
Uploaded by: FREEMAN
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Don't you want me baby?
Nothing earth-shattering
Voices is a decent enough movie with good production value, creepy soundtrack and calm cinematography. The story isn't novel but works with the tempo of the film. The movies spends a lot of time on characterization especially that of the main character Lillian, we see her grow from a kid to a teenager to an adult. We see her struggle as she tries to fit it the society. We see her make friends and acquaintances and overall how she came to be the present day Lillian. Every stage is pretty fun to watch but they slow down the pace a lot, they spend way too much time on it, that they forget the bad guys and explain the supernatural elements of the movie like why do the spirits wants to be her "baby" why must it be her? 'cause she's blind? If so, are there not other blind women? Why the "voice" choose her? what's so special about her? Why not other women? And how does Diana knows, all of a sudden, about the supernatural things and that it's connected to Lillian? The third act, is a let down and felt rushed, the bad guys are laughable and somewhat cartoonish. The resolution of the conflict is too simple considering that much build up. The acting is decent; Tracy Adkins is pretty good in lead role, the supporting casts ranges from decent to good to atrocious.
Overall, Voices does a good job in terms of character development and has a good production value but the plot stagnates a lot.
Needs work
After visiting her father's grave, Lilly (Valerie Jane Parker, the 2021 version of Wrong Turn) and her mother get into a car accident that leaves her blind and an orphan. As she struggles with the loss of her sight, she starts to hear voices and just thinks that it's some form of synesthesia. The truth is that these voices are souls stuck in limbo looking for a way back into our world. And that way? Years later, it becomes Lily's unborn child.
Voices is the first full-length film by director Nathaniel Nuon, working with writer Daniel Hathcock (they also have a film called Paralyzed in production). They also have some known faces in this film, like Ashley Bell (The Last Exorcism),Jordan Ladd (Cabin Fever) and Leslie Easterbrook (Sgt. Callahan from the Police Academy series).
Somewhere in this film is a great idea and a good film, but it struggles to emerge. The central conceit of a blind girl rising past a rough childhood and the voices that helped her deal with the loss of her sight becoming either demonic or cold cases left behind is a fantastic storytelling engine that a lot can be done with. Instead, this movie is never sure what movie it wants to be. Is it a drama with bits of the supernatural? Is it a false memory story? An exploration of growing up with a handicap? Or is it all of these things at the same time and unsure of itself?
I wanted to like this movie more than I did, so I'll keep an eye out for Paralyzed and hope that the filmmakers will use this film - which trust me, has some worthwhile moments - as a learning experience. Judicious editing of twenty minutes or so would have gone a long way, too.