You know when your Dad walks around the house turning the lights off to save money? He is putting your life in danger… At least according to this. The viral short film Lights Out scored its director the chance to adapt it into a feature, produced by James Wan. And here’s the trailer…

The plot sees a young boy and his estranged sister confronted by an evil entity that only appears when the lights are out. As mentioned it’s based on the excellent 2013 short film (pictured top), which you can watch here –

Director David Sandberg certainly knows how to build a spooky atmosphere and construct a brilliant jump scare (more examples on his YouTube channel). What’s unknown is how he’ll be with character, dialogue or telling a longer-form story. The feature script comes from Eric A. Heisserer who did terribly with the Nightmare on Elm Street remake, but pretty well with The Thing remake.

The movie’s produced by James Wan (Insidious), who himself made Saw as a short film before directing it as his feature debut.

With its simple but creepy premise it has significant potential as a launchpad. Going by the trailer I wish it wasn’t so confined to a generic house setting, standard backstory and it had a scare as good as the one in the short. But I suspect this one has more up its sleeve…

Lights Out stars Teresa Palmer, Gabriel Bateman and Alexander DiPersia. It’s released 22nd July in the US, 19th August in the UK.