Movie Review: THE WOMAN IN BLACK

THE WOMAN IN BLACK
UK 2012
Directed by James Watkins
Written by Jane Goldman
Based on the novel "The Woman In Black" by Susan Hill
Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Ciaran Hinds, Janet McTeer


SYNOPSIS:  In the early 20th century, recently widowed solicitor Arthur Kipps (Radcliffe) is called upon to handle the estate of a Mrs. Alice Drablow, who lived in the isolated and uber-creepy Eel Marsh House.  No locals will assist him in his task, and most try to shoo him out of town, with the exception of a Mr. Sam Daily (Hinds) and his wife Elisabeth (McTeer), who have also had a tragic death in their family.  But after Arthur witnesses a mysterious woman, draped in black, walking the grounds of the abandoned manor, he begins to understand why the villagers have been so desperate to keep him away.


THOUGHTS:  It's the first of the modern Hammer Films to actually feel like one of their older classics, despite the lack of anachronistic haircuts and cardboard sets.  It's a old-school, "things that go bump in the night" type of haunted house story, and if you're brave (or foolish) enough to watch it alone in the dark, it's guaranteed to scare the willies out of you.  (To which my poor wife can attest!)


Fast paced in parts, which can be the mortal enemy of suspense, but the expedience here is mostly to trim the fat.  Not a great deal of time is wasted on the typical "Doth my eyes deceive me?" dilemma that protagonists in these films ponder; Arthur sees something supernatural, and knows it's supernatural.  Moving on.


Radcliffe doesn't have the most expressive face, which is problematic in a film where he's expected to show a broad range of terror, but he rises admirably to the task with the tools given to him.  His character has a rational, reasoned, and brave response to the strange goings on, so as he is confronted with abject horror, the tightening of his jaw seems a grab at tenuously holding on to his fragile sanity.

The film is very pretty to look at, making great use of location photography.  It was shot by the sparsely active DP Tim Maurice-Jones, whose previous work you're most likely to have seen in the films Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch.


I've giving it a slight demerit for the ending.  It doesn't ruin the film, but the final scene should have either been done differently, or much better.  It has the stench of a reshoot about it, quite frankly.  All in all, though. . .


REVIEW:  6 (LIKE)