It Follows won wide acclaim, so I struggled with whether or not to include it in this series. But it’s just too damned good at what it sets out to do to leave out.

This is a film that burns into life in its first few minutes, demanding we respect its monster. Not since Jaws has something from this genre had such perfect establishing shots. The focus on the unnamed young woman and her grisly fate is performed via the art of subtraction, and wouldn’t have been unexpected from Hitchcock himself. Nothing is explained, but the stakes are made obvious, and our pulse is made to race.

From there, the film circles back and focuses on our heroine, Jay (Maika Monroe). Jay and her boyfriend have a chance to do what many young people want to do when they have a moment of privacy in a car, but this dalliance takes a dark turn, and Jay finds herself waking up in an abandoned parking deck, where said boyfriend explains to her how this “thing” has been following him, that it must not catch him, and that–in an effort to save his own skin–he’s deliberately been intimate with Jay.

Hence, the Rules: The monster will only come after the latest person to get the curse via sexual contact with the most recent person in the “chain” (hence the boyfriend’s motivation). Only those affected by the curse can see the monster. And to make matters worse, this terrifying entity can look like anyone it wishes. It never stops moving towards its chosen quarry.

When Jay first sees it, the thing is a nude woman. The second time it comes after her, it looks completely different. Perhaps one of the most underappreciated performances of the year is that shared by this film’s many actors who portray the monster at various points. People from all walks of life all manage to embody this malevolent, unflinching, alien presence. We never think we’re looking at bit players. There’s too much determined malice at work; the monster is like a throbbing wound that demands your attention, and it’ll have you slipping into paranoia, just waiting for it to turn up in every scene.

Because of the acting, the subtlety, and the morose scenery and soundtrack, It Follows looks and feels like a delightful throwback made in the seventies or eighties. And it’s enjoyable watching Jay exhaust increasingly desperate strategies in the name of holding the monster at bay.

So this would be a successful film if this was all it brought to the table, but what really makes it work is the subconscious way the viewer latches on to its theme. All of us face the Inescapable Force called death, at some point or another, and it will gradually pluck away everyone we care about. But there are other such manifestations of the Inescapable Force many of us must confront. It Follows can be taken as a perfect allegory for the affliction of a mental disorder, or an addiction, or confronting some terrible disease, or living with the consequences of some awful past decision. Like Jay, many of us will face things we would be desperate to simply have leave us alone. It’s also the perfect movie at a time when we’ve been made more aware of sexual assault, as everything Jay experiences isn’t far off what a rape victim might endure.

I’ve said before that science fiction turns a mirror on the human experience, and horror shatters that mirror and examines the pieces. It Follows reminds us the shards have sharp edges. We can’t write off Jay’s dilemma as the product of imagination, only its monster. That makes it that much more gripping and disturbing. For inviting the kind of discussion and reflection this genre does at is best, It Follows had to be included.

In the next review we’ll turn our attention to one of the most stylish horror films of the last decade, which came from the last country you might expect.