I can understand you disliking the photography but I wouldn't say that the storytelling hewed "very closely to the expectations".

I'm trying to avoid spoiling things for those who haven't seen it, but almost every character became more multi-dimensional and the story progressed in unexpected ways. It took the worn-out tropes and flipped them over. Even your singular use of the word "genre" confuses me. Was there only one genre? It started out as a horror movie and then evolved into some sci-fi secret experiment narrative.