Looking for Halloween night plans? “Ouija,” a new horror film released last Friday, is perfect for Halloween night if you’re too cool for trick-or-treating but not cool enough to get invited to a party.

Directed by Stiles White and starring Olivia Cooke and Ana Coto, “Ouija” reached number one in the box office after it earned $20 million. Complete with demons, spirits, and ominous noises in creaking houses, the film brings a modern insight into the history and myths surrounding the Ouija board, a spiritual board used during séances to answer questions and communicate with the dead.

The film starts out with a scene in a little girl’s bedroom, where two girls are sitting on a bed with an Ouija board between them. One of the girls starts the game by listing off the three rules: never play alone, never play in a graveyard, and always end by saying goodbye.

Fast forward 10 years, and the names of the now teenage girls are revealed: Laine Morris (Olivia Cooke), and Debbie Galardi (Shelley Hennig). The scene opens with Laine and Debbie standing outside Debbie’s house, and Laine questions Debbie about why she has been acting so strange lately. Debbie responds by bringing up the Ouija board they played with as kids, and says that she recently found it and used it, but quickly adds that she is fine and that Laine shouldn’t worry.

The next morning, Debbie’s parents find their daughter hung from the ceiling.

At first, everyone assumes that Debbie had committed suicide, including Laine, who keeps asking herself what could have driven her best friend to kill herself. Desperate for an answer, Laine remembers the Ouija board, and how it can supposedly be used to talk to the dead. With the help of her skeptical friends and sister, Laine attempts to use the Ouija board in Debbie’s house and communicate with Debbie. After receiving a disturbing message, all hell seems to break loose for Laine and her friends in the following days.

Unlike most other horror films, “Ouija” has a plot that develops throughout the entire movie, and doesn’t have a slow or boring beginning. Also, the plot twists and story developments are easy to follow and don’t confuse viewers, despite the many strange occurrences that take place in the film.

Although the movie’s main theme is horror and spirituality, it also has an ongoing element of friendship, starting with Laine’s determination to say goodbye to her best friend.

Aside from the movie’s deeper theme, “Ouija” covers the basic horror/paranormal movie elements, but in an intriguing way. Also, the movie has just the right amount of scariness- it’ll make viewers jump a few times (and maybe even yelp), but it won’t give them nightmares for a week.

The actors did an amazing job in their roles, acting extremely skeptical at the beginning of the movie and becoming increasingly freaked out as the film progressed. Cooke delivered an especially great performance, although there were times that I wanted to yell at her through the screen and tell her to get the hell out of Debbie’s house and away from the Ouija board (but I guess that’s how it is with any horror movie).

“Ouija” is a well-done horror movie, perfect for Halloween night if you’re too cool for trick-or-treating but not cool enough to get invited to a party.

Props to the producers for making a good, PG-13 horror movie. It’s getting harder and harder to sneak into those rated R movies these days.