October Horror 2013: 2 - The Uninvited

The Uninvited was originally from our Ghost Stories week.  I wasn't aware of it at the time but it's also an English language remake of the Korean ghost movie A Tale of Two Sisters, however it has several differences from that story and neither movie is particularly faithful to the folk story on which they're both based.

Anyway, The Uninvited is about Anna (played by Emily Browning) returning home after being institutionalized following an explosion at her home that killed her infirm mother.  Once there she has to contend with her rebellious sister and a strained relationship with her new step mother, who was previously her mom's home nurse.  It's an awkward situation, only made worse by her father's lack of engagement and the reappearance of the boy she used to mack it with.  Oh, and hallucinations.  She begins hallucinating at night, first an incredibly creepy version of her dead mother that slide and crawls stiffly along the floor and a pale red-haired girl who keeps jumping out and telling her she's next.

There's a lot of great surreal imagery like a falling glass of milk that turns into blood when it hits the floor.  It's got a pretty good creepy atmosphere but eventually it loses it to procedural mystery work, which was a bit disappointing.  I will say that I found it much less mind-bending that the Korean version, which I think at one point had 2 levels of hallucinations.  However the Korean movie had a much more darkly oppressive atmosphere while The Uninvited is set in absolutely beautiful places, which lend it a nice contrast when things go bump in the night.

The story is nicely coherent while still being interesting, though I think most audiences will figure out at least one of the twists way before the movie decides to reveal it.  It's definitely worth it for the hallucinations in the first half.  There was only one thing I really didn't like and a few minor disappointments.

Tomorrow's film is Secret Window, originally from Stephen King week.

--PXA