# It Follows - that compact mirror smartphone
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [July 5, 2015, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296 "2015-07-05T05:48:09Z")
**Posts on this page:** 9
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Don\_Draper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_Draper)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/1 "2015-07-05T05:48:09Z")
Tell me a thing such as that exists! That is too bizarre a device to NOT be real. How the hell can I get one?
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### Author:  [@Smid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smid)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/2 "2015-07-05T11:41:51Z")
I thought it was a bit out of place, almost like an obvious product placement without the name…
I still watch for people walking directly towards me in crowds. Only watched the movie friday.
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### Author:  [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/3 "2015-07-05T11:45:32Z")
For some reason, I couldn’t place the time the events in the movie occur at all—some things seemed to me to suggest eighties, but clearly, the smartphone completely contradicted that. It’s well worth watching, though.
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### Author:  [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/4 "2015-07-05T13:16:44Z")
Haven’t seen this movie - explain please?
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### Author:  [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/5 "2015-07-05T13:56:55Z")
The film was deliberately supposed to include props from various time periods:
> **[David Robert Mitchell on his striking new horror film, It Follows](https://www.avclub.com/david-robert-mitchell-on-his-striking-new-horror-film-1798277440)**
>
> Five years ago, Michigan native David Robert Mitchell burst onto the indie filmmaking scene with The Myth Of The American Sleepover, a kind of dreamy, naturalistic cousin to teen ensemble films like American Graffiti and Dazed And Confused. It was a...
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### Author:  [@Don\_Draper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_Draper)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/6 "2015-07-05T18:47:15Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#):
>
> Haven’t seen this movie - explain please?
A character in this film is shown several times throughout the course of it holding what looks like a very classic [compact mirror](http://media3.adband.co.uk/899-2242-thickbox/elegance-compact-mirror.jpg), but turns out to be a smartphone / app device. Instead of seeing her reflection, there is text she scrolls through like an iphone or droid.
It put me in mind of the “Gilligan’s Island” episode with the dream sequence in which Gilligan is a secret agent and all the other castaways are enemy agents out to get him: Mary Ann is depicted as an office secretary who uses a Dick Tracy style compact mirror/two-way video link to report in to “Blofeld” (Mr. Howell.)
Anyway, I did a bit of research on the film this morning and learned that the film is based off a bunch of nightmares the writer/director once had. That puts a lot of the jarring, anachronistic items into context - the film isn’t the real world, but a dream world. The whole film is a nightmare (much like dreams in general use free association symbolism and ‘mix & match’ elements from different points in your real life.) Unfortunately, it leads me to suspect that alas the compact smartphone isn’t a real thing.
But that doesn’t mean it CAN"T be! Some smart, enterpriing engineer get on this right away. I want my compact smartphone!🙂
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### Author:  [@Telperion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperion)
#### Post date: [July 5, 2015, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/7 "2015-07-05T21:12:14Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#):
>
> But that doesn’t mean it CAN"T be! Some smart, enterpriing engineer get on this right away. I want my compact smartphone!🙂
There have been some attempts to produce smartphones in smaller form factors, but they don’t seem to have sold very well because I suppose nobody really wants to hold a conversation on something like this:
[http://mobile-techspot.blogspot.se/2010/04/alcatel-ice3-qwerty-flip-phone-launched.html](http://mobile-techspot.blogspot.se/2010/04/alcatel-ice3-qwerty-flip-phone-launched.html)
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### Author:  [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2015, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/8 "2015-07-17T05:53:25Z")
I just watched this tonight and really liked the visuals and the non-specific time period look. A mixture of present day, cars from the 70’s, fashion from the 80’s, etc. No cell phones or computers but the “compact mirror” e-reader device. Not a perfect film by any means, but pretty effective in terms of what the director was attempting to achieve.
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### Author:  [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2015, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-follows-that-compact-mirror-smartphone/724296/9 "2015-07-17T08:59:15Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#):
>
> Anyway, I did a bit of research on the film this morning and learned that the film is based off a bunch of nightmares the writer/director once had. That puts a lot of the jarring, anachronistic items into context - the film isn’t the real world, but a dream world. The whole film is a nightmare (much like dreams in general use free association symbolism and ‘mix & match’ elements from different points in your real life.) Unfortunately, it leads me to suspect that alas the compact smartphone isn’t a real thing.
>
> But that doesn’t mean it CAN"T be! Some smart, enterpriing engineer get on this right away. I want my compact smartphone!🙂
Is metrosexual still a thing? 'Cos if your username reflects your gender, and it’s _not_ (still a thing), anachronism will be only a minor consideration in deciding to carry one of those around.