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The Night House, 2020
Beth (Rebecca Hall) is a high school teacher who is reeling from the sudden death by suicide of her husband, Owen (Evan Jonigkeit). As she begins to sort through his things, Beth discovers a series of disturbing items, such as photos of other women, and strange floor plans related to their home. Suffering from strange dreams and visions, Beth tries to unravel her husband's secrets.
This is a solid haunted house tale, anchored by the always-reliable Rebecca Hall. In the end, though, it did leave me a bit wanting.
My only real issues came in the very last act and where the film concludes. But up to that point, the movie is full of disturbing and satisfying imagery. There are oodles of spooky things to be found here: floor plans mixed with notes about ancient mazes; fetishized statues with nails driven through them; stereos that turn themselves on in the middle of the night.
Hall is very strong as Beth, and she captures a kind of jangly impulsiveness that allows you to not sit there saying "Why didn't she just XYZ?". It's a performance that doesn't make you question, for example, why Beth doesn't call the police at a certain moment, or why she walks away from a seemingly strange and important clue about her husband's state of mind.
I also enjoyed Sarah Goldberg in a supporting role as Beth's best friend and co-worker, Claire. In a movie like this, you basically suspect that anyone might be a villain or an accomplice, and I really enjoyed Goldberg's take on the character. Likewise Vondie Curtis-Hall as Beth's lakeside neighbor, Mel, and Stacy Martin as a woman who looks a lot like Beth and who may have been having an affair with Owen.
The character of Owen is tricky. From the first minutes of the movie, he is no longer alive. What we do see of his is in glimpses of old home videos and distorted voices or visions. Jonigkeit is certainly handsome and does a good job of looking dark and mysterious, but knowing so little about him made it hard to know how to feel about the way he was shown in the visions.
Unfortunately, as things begin to get explained in the last act, the film lost me a bit. While I'd been along for the ride up to this point, I started having some bothersome questions. (MAJOR SPOILERS!!!!)
Definitely an easy recommend for any horror fans, but I wish I'd been more satisfied with the last half hour.
The Night House, 2020
Beth (Rebecca Hall) is a high school teacher who is reeling from the sudden death by suicide of her husband, Owen (Evan Jonigkeit). As she begins to sort through his things, Beth discovers a series of disturbing items, such as photos of other women, and strange floor plans related to their home. Suffering from strange dreams and visions, Beth tries to unravel her husband's secrets.
This is a solid haunted house tale, anchored by the always-reliable Rebecca Hall. In the end, though, it did leave me a bit wanting.
My only real issues came in the very last act and where the film concludes. But up to that point, the movie is full of disturbing and satisfying imagery. There are oodles of spooky things to be found here: floor plans mixed with notes about ancient mazes; fetishized statues with nails driven through them; stereos that turn themselves on in the middle of the night.
Hall is very strong as Beth, and she captures a kind of jangly impulsiveness that allows you to not sit there saying "Why didn't she just XYZ?". It's a performance that doesn't make you question, for example, why Beth doesn't call the police at a certain moment, or why she walks away from a seemingly strange and important clue about her husband's state of mind.
I also enjoyed Sarah Goldberg in a supporting role as Beth's best friend and co-worker, Claire. In a movie like this, you basically suspect that anyone might be a villain or an accomplice, and I really enjoyed Goldberg's take on the character. Likewise Vondie Curtis-Hall as Beth's lakeside neighbor, Mel, and Stacy Martin as a woman who looks a lot like Beth and who may have been having an affair with Owen.
The character of Owen is tricky. From the first minutes of the movie, he is no longer alive. What we do see of his is in glimpses of old home videos and distorted voices or visions. Jonigkeit is certainly handsome and does a good job of looking dark and mysterious, but knowing so little about him made it hard to know how to feel about the way he was shown in the visions.
Unfortunately, as things begin to get explained in the last act, the film lost me a bit. While I'd been along for the ride up to this point, I started having some bothersome questions. (MAJOR SPOILERS!!!!)
WARNING: spoilers below
We come to learn that the demon or dark entity that is haunting Beth has made itself known to Owen, in the form of trying to get him to kill Beth. Owen is aware enough to decide that this is a dark spirit, and uses mazes, spells, and other trickery to murder women in Beth's place. Um, okay. So he goes from not believing in "that stuff" to believing it so much that he will kill multiple people, but never actually talk to his wife about it?
And then we also get in the last act that the creature is able to be both seen and felt by Beth, to the point that it almost gets her to kill herself. This is where I get really confused: this thing spent months trying to get Owen to do the job, but why? If the end game is just to have Beth dead, why not go to work on her? By her own admission she was the one who had always suffered from serious depression issues.
And finally, I find it kind of amazing that Owen was able to get away with his murders so easily. He was doing things like going after women from a bookstore where he frequently shopped. He was going after women in a specific age bracket and look. You're telling me that half a dozen women who look like Rebecca Hall went missing in a short period of time and it wasn't huge news to the entire country?
I know this sounds like nitpicking, but all these questions just started popping up for me in the last 20 minutes or so.
And then we also get in the last act that the creature is able to be both seen and felt by Beth, to the point that it almost gets her to kill herself. This is where I get really confused: this thing spent months trying to get Owen to do the job, but why? If the end game is just to have Beth dead, why not go to work on her? By her own admission she was the one who had always suffered from serious depression issues.
And finally, I find it kind of amazing that Owen was able to get away with his murders so easily. He was doing things like going after women from a bookstore where he frequently shopped. He was going after women in a specific age bracket and look. You're telling me that half a dozen women who look like Rebecca Hall went missing in a short period of time and it wasn't huge news to the entire country?
I know this sounds like nitpicking, but all these questions just started popping up for me in the last 20 minutes or so.
Definitely an easy recommend for any horror fans, but I wish I'd been more satisfied with the last half hour.