Hola all. Massawyrm here.
One of the things I love about Harry is that while there are many times where he and I differ radically in our opinions, there are also a number of times in which we pretty much write the exact same review word for word. And this is pretty much one of those occasions, so I'll try not to repeat his all that much. THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT is not a particularly good film. But before you jump to the talkback to say “No shit, I could tell that by the trailers,” don’t. The trailers are incredibly misleading. The film isn’t the kind of bad that the trailers make it out to be. In fact, if this were a standard, by the numbers horror release, it would be a worthy B-grade horror film to scare the teens and pleasantly entertain horror nuts.
Except that the film opens with the phrase BASED ON A TRUE STORY.
Now the problem with this is that we’ve seen films BASED on true stories before. And many of them are bullshit. My favorite example is FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS in which the film weaves a fantasy about Odessa Permian making it to the state finals in 1988 beofre being tragically defeated. Didn’t happen. In fact, the real story (the one they wrote the book about) was far more interesting. That year my alma mater Judson Highschool is credited with winning – with an asterisk - having won the only football game ever decided by a court of law. But that’s another story. When you see this at the beginning of a film, the idea is that you’ll find yourself more invested in it because OMG IT REALLY HAPPENED. At least, that’s what the studio would like to happen.
No. What it does these days is forces the audience to put its skeptic-hats on. We don’t watch them like we watch a film, we watch them like we watch an episode of UNSOLVED MYSTERIES or AMERICA’S MOST WANTED. We see them as dramatic recreations. And every time something happens, we ask ourselves: did that really happen? Or is it just Hollywood bullshit? We’re not able to be carried along by the story or get caught up in the fictional elements because rather than seeing a movie we’re asking ourselves: why haven’t I heard about this on the news?
Well, that’s exactly the experience you get watching THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT. There’s very little bad or awkward about the film. There’re some very cool elements to it – in fact the fictional stuff is cool enough in its own right to have made a fine fictional horror film (without the BASED ON gimmick.) Instead, every time you’re confronted with something truly horrific you can’t get involved in it – you have to question it. No fucking way did that REALLY happen. The intended effect of making you believe the horror is real is actually counteracted by that fact these days. The only way to make it REALLY scary is to get every detail EXACT and hire someone who can amplify the scares with mood and realism rather than gimmicks and effects.
Most of the scares here don’t work. They’re jumpers. If the camera ever rests on a mirror, something will move or appear behind it. Then when someone looks to confirm what they did (or didn’t) see, OMG IT’S FUCKING GONE. Woo. Scary. What scenes are genuinely creepy end up undercut by the “reality factor.”
To its credit it is fairly well acted. Virginia Madsen is very solid as a freaking out suburban mother, Kyle Gallner is strong as her dying son, and Elias Koteas steals the whole freaking show as the dying preacher who can also see into the land of the dead. In fact, the Koteas element is so great that I was really digging everything about the film whenever he was involved. But as the film draws to its very cinematic climax, questions about how much of this could have really happened cockblock any of the real tension you should be feeling and ultimately leave the film as a blasé tour through trumped up events. Whether what the family claims really happened or not, what’s on screen clearly didn’t – and you end up feeling robbed and cheated, even if what you expect to see is entirely fiction.
While some of the concepts and images have stuck with me, they have done so in a purely intellectual manner – in that way that you say “that was pretty cool”, but it certainly doesn’t have me jumping at shadows or afraid to step out on my back porch without the light on like a good horror film should leave you. It is far and away better than the trailer presents itself – but never quite as good as it should be.
Until next time friends, smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em.
Massawyrm
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