NOTE: I avoid spoilers as much as possible in this review, but to give a proper opinion there is some allusion to what you can expect and as a result it could either help or hinder your viewing experience based on how you look at it. If you are going to see this film no matter what I say, read the first paragraph and go see it and then return to read the review. Otherwise, the full review is certain to help you make up your mind.
There’s only one way to review The Uninvited and give thinking audiences a fair chance of enjoying the film and that is to tell you to continually ask yourself, “What is going on?” Never settle with a decision and keep asking questions. Things are not necessarily as they seem, which isn’t an entire surprise since there is no way this film could have been as straight forward as presented, but if you are able to keep your mind engaged you may enjoy yourself.
Based on the Korean horror A Tale of Two Sisters, the film begins as Anna Rydell (Emily Browning) returns home after a stint in a psychiatric hospital. Her terminally-ill mother recently died and Anna tried to kill herself and now suffers from disturbing dreams involving death, animated dead bodies in garbage bags, bleeding key holes and massive explosions. Despite these dreams her doctor thinks she is well enough to return home. Okay — if he says so — after all I don’t have a Ph.D.
Once home she is greeted by her loving father (David Strathairn), her sister Alex (Arielle Kebbel) and her father’s new love interest and mother’s former nanny Rachel Summers (Elizabeth Banks). Rachel is the focus here as she snarls, sneers and delivers dirty glances at every opportunity. Alex tells her sister how terrible things have been since Anna left and further advances the plot with her theories and hatred for Rachel. Questions begin to bubble to the surface — in the film and in your head. Is Rachel the lecherous gold-digging murderer she appears to be? Is this movie a ghost story or a journey into psychosis?
Traditional American horror movie fans will go into this film expecting the typical PG-13 horror cliches and for the most part that’s just what you get, but the film does manage to elevate itself slightly with a quite accomplished ending that I am not shy about admitting I didn’t see coming. However, at the same time I felt cheated. The filmmakers were never fair with their presentation of story elements, something crucial in a film where the intrigue of it all is to try and figure out what is going on along the way. What good are the clues if they turn out to be lies?
For the most part the cast does very well with the material they are given and once the story is entirely realized the performances make much more sense now that you have a better understanding of why this line was read like that and why that glance was given. This is to say it is hard to judge this film along the way, at least if you are trying to convince yourself it is a good movie.
In terms of those involved, Kebbel, while perfectly fine in her role, continues to serve as the Britney Spears of acting. David Strathairn brings an added level of attention to the film due to his talent and Elizabeth Banks does a fair job as the stepmom from hell. Most of the weight, however, falls on the shoulders of Lemony Snicket actress, Emily Browning who does an awfully good job carrying the majority of the load in what boils down to a slightly above average female-driven thriller. UK directors Charles and Thomas Guard do their best to offer jump scares along the way, but so many of them fall flat and never manage to really scare at all. At this point I can’t imagine creepy visions of dead people crawling on the floor scares many people anymore as it is something that seems to find its way into just about every single horror-thriller as of late. That said, they did do a satisfactory job of pulling themselves up out of the cellar following a lackluster 80 minutes to deliver a 7 minute ending that makes up for a little of it. The question is, was it worth it?
I was glad The Uninvited didn’t devolve into the typical studio horror trash it seemed it was going to be and we have seen so often over the recent years. Unfortunately, the majority of it still relied on the same tactics and caused me to lose a lot of interest until the final moments. This is never a good sign considering we judge a movie on the sum of its parts and not just the candy coated shell, but this one could have been a lot worse.
