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Make no mistake that unlike the previous film The Abandoned is polished, features stunning cinematography and a haunting score. What it doesn't have is any real entertainment value or true sense of logic. The film works best as horrifically beautiful sequences and hauntingly grotesque images. Some of which will be permanantly burned into your psyche. But Nacho Cerdas story of a young woman that returns to her native country to learn about her adopted parents and discovers horrifying truths just really isn't that involving. The film however does feature plenty of symbolism and subtext but feels like it goes on forever and doesn't feel as scary as it should've been. However, this is a respectable horror film the performances are soso and the pacing is off but the film looks gorgeous and works best as a piece of art. Certain scenes should be studied but as a whole just isn't completely successful. But the scenes that are effective and cringe worthy are disturbingly atmospheric and memorable, they just seem to drop the ball halfway through and keep teasing at some sort of payoff that never comes. Nonetheless the film makes for an interesting viewing.

ABANDONED is a sleek Spanish production with acceptable budget and packs genuine chills , suspense , tension , and shocks , it's a terror-thriller very exciting . It deals with an American film producer named Marie (Anastasia Hille) goes back to her homeland, Russia (although shot in Bulgaria), where her mother's (Paraskeva) dead body has been found under strange circumstances. She never knew her, having been adopted and brought to America as a baby. The only track as to what might have happened is an abandoned , isolated house in the mountains that supposedly belong to her natural parents. Being the only next of kin, she inherits the farm , but no one will take her there as the local superstitions state that the area is condemned . Only one man will embark on such a long and risked trip . A stranger that oddly seems to know quite a bit about her history. But once arrived the guide mysteriously disappears, forcing Marie to explore the derelict place alone. She discovers someone else on the property. A man named Nikolai (Karel Roden), who claims to have been lured there exactly in the same manner, so he could discover the truth behind his unknown past as well. They become stranded in the immense compound, plagued by horrifying, ghostly visions .The problem is that the ghosts that wander around are their own. Dead versions of themselves marauder between the house in the night . Time begins to change in reverse as history re-lives itself in front of their very eyes. While both their ghosts, illustrating how they will die, patiently await their living counterparts to expire. A cycle of terror comes to fruition, as they are revealed the reason they have been summoned for this perverse meeting . And the cruel secret behind their family takes place at the end of the movie.

This is a horror story with creepy atmosphere and plenty of twists and turns . It contains mystery,violence, gore , suspense in a dark environment with imposing tension and intrigue . This spooky movie produced by the successful Catalan producer Julio Fernandez displays terror, shocks, hard-edged drama , plot twists and creepy images . The story come to life in a terrifying fashion, giving it a haunting ominous ambiance that often shows the past , present and future at a nightmare's atmosphere. While the look is suitable atmospheric and ghastly , the argument stretches plausibility to the breaking point in a surprising finale . Xavi Gimenez cinematography is excellent creating a frightening and scary atmosphere filmed on location in Sofia, Bugaria, he's expert on sombre photography as proved in ¨ Fragile, Intact, and Nameless ¨. Mesmerizing and intriguing music by Alfonso Conde . The motion picture is well written and directed by Nacho Cerda who create a powerful story that blends chills , thrills , suspense and familiar drama in a cleverly devised plot that certainly offers more than the usual terror film . Cerda is a good director who formerly made amazing and gory shorts as ¨The awakening¨ , ¨Genesis¨and ¨Aftermath¨. Rating : Good : 6,5 . This is a frightening , chilling, and horror drama , all at their best that will appeal to terror buffs .

Taking us back and forth 40 years in Russia and it is obvious not a lot has changed from 1966 up until today, I found this to be an exceptional use of location to create a dark eerie presence and visual display on screen. Director Nacho Cerda got the most out of the 2 lead roles (Anastasia Hille and Karel Roden), I had never seen either one of them and I think they did a reasonably good job working out the kinks of the film. The story is the only thing that really bothered me, I tried to stay with it but honestly there were some times that I did get a little lost but every time I found myself wondering what was going on, the characters answered my questions. I was wondering how Nicolai got to the house and Marie asked him that very question. I thought the movie was well thought out and sound affects and visuals really helped draw you in to the film. A lot of moments that made my wife jump and grab my arm tighter.

The Abandoned was billed as the fan favorite of the Horrorfest (i.e., 8 Films to Die For) that occurred in late 2006. Most of the rating lists that I have seen from posters on IMDb have ranked The Abandoned very high, while ranking the Japanese film Reincarnation in the middle of the pack. I personally thought that Reincarnation was very good, so I figured that the re-release of The Abandoned would give me the opportunity to experience what everyone has been talking about. After the show one thing is for certain: The Abandoned could not have been the best film at the Horrorfest, because Reincarnation runs circles around this film in terms of storyline and entertainment value.

This film had everything it needed as far as atmosphere is concerned. The woodland areas, the river, and the house were perfect to build atmosphere and a sense of dread. Unfortunately, the filmmakers were too impatient to allow the fantastic environment to mature and reach the viewer in full effect. A character would be walking in the dimly lit forest, and just when I began to take in the atmosphere, the filmmakers would intrude with an excessively loud scream or noise for no apparent reason. There were so many "false scares" in this film that they effectively mitigated any atmospheric effect whatsoever. In other words, the filmmakers "prematurely ejaculated" with stupid sound effects before the viewer was able to reach "atmospheric orgasm."

Ironically, there were probably a dozen or so "jump-out-of-your-seat" scares during the first portion of the film, and most of them were in situations with no real danger. For example, the opening scene shows a few babies crying in a truck, which transitions to an airplane arriving at an airport. Regrettably, the director couldn't stand by and allow such a transition to pass without cranking up the damn sound to the point where my eardrums were ready to explode. The filmmakers are apparently stupid enough to think that scene transitions with sonic booms clocking in at over 200 decibels are somehow entertaining.

Perhaps the most common method of premature sound ejaculation in The Abandoned is the use of voices coming from nowhere. These voices begin at a whisper and crescendo to a loud scream in between scenes. Instead of just allowing the scene transition to occur, the filmmakers would use these idiotic gimmicks to make the viewer jump in their seat before continuing on to the next chapter. Imagine someone sneaking up behind you in a store, only to then scream in your ear and startle you. Any no-talent hack can do that. It's not scary. They're just being a jerk. That's what The Abandoned is – a jerk who annoys you at their every opportunity.

It's really too bad, because the concept that presents itself at the very end of the film is quite good. It's a blending of doppelgangers and premonitions that works well for the few seconds that it presents itself, but everything leading up to that point is nothing more than 90 minutes of sonic booms and premature ejaculations.

Not recommended.

Reading over almost every single one star review on this, it would appear that every single person that ranked it as such cannot follow even a fairly simple plot as this (I see lots of "It makes no sense" and "Nothing is explained" comments.). Really sad to see good gems in the rough like this getting trashed by people that frankly shouldn't be reviewing movies, maybe I'm an elitist, I don't know, but I'm sorry, if you couldn't follow the story of The Abandoned, I really don't know what to say.

This movie is kept from being a top tier creepy movie simply by pacing issues, that's probably my main problem with it which drags it's score into the 7 range (might as well be a 10 for the amount of drek horror made since the mid 90's). This movie has impeccable atmosphere, the kind you can cut through with a knife which is oh so important for any great haunted house film. The atmosphere itself was incredibly creepy, the director should have let the audience just stew in that a bit before getting right to the point so to speak within minutes of walking into the house, it really lessens the impact of the imagery and the antagonists in this movie, but doesn't destroy it by any means.

What stood out the most to me is that it was a very original idea (as far as i know, I have never seen anything quite like it) and like The Baby's room, I love wildly original takes on my favorite horror genre, the haunted house movie. It's deliciously dark without relying on cheap gore, but if that's what you're looking for, there's some incredibly brutal and disturbing scenes in it. The story and acting and characters are good enough to be very compelling but at the same time, I think a little more character development couldn't have hurt. yet we have people screaming "TOO SLOW TOO BORING" and 1 starring it so this is why character development is sadly all but dead in horror movies.

The imagery and photography was fantastic, sound appropriately creepy if severely overdone at times but only a few times.

Just see it. Even if it doesn't scare you like it didn't scare me (i can count the movies on one hand that have achieved this, this is the holy grail of horror for me.), it's very creepy and quite unnerving and just an all around enjoyable flick. Definitely gets the thumbs up from me.