Tuesday, February 13, 2018

200 Items Or Less: The Woman In Black (2012)

A few thoughts: In spite of an upsetting over-reliance on jump-scares and terror chords, there is a lot to like about this modern Hammer horror film. For one, the setting is great. I love the dreary town, foggy moors, and decrepit old mansion it's set in. I like the paranoid townsfolk delivering all the "don't go up to that house!" dialogue straight out of a classic horror film. I like the cinematography and period-appropriate attention to detail throughout. But beyond these surface things, the movie starts to fall apart. The jump-scares and things popping out to scare the cameraman become tedious -- let the creepy images be scary on their own, you don't need to throw in explosively loud banging noises to shock people into thinking they're creepy. All it does is disrupt the atmosphere and come across as cheap. The music is derivative, but identifiable enough to work, I just wish they'd done more with the orchestral music and less with the "Blaaaah!!! Krpshhh!!!" crap. It's a solid horror movie that could have been much better just by a few omissions and some toned-down audio.


Who would I recommend it to? People who don't mind horror movies that are more interested in having things pop out and make noises at them than with being creepy in more subtle ways.

My grade: C-

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