El pantano

THE MARSH is an absolutely typical ghost story about a lonely woman moving into a lonely house that turns out to be haunted by...yada yada. The end result is that it plays out exactly as you'd expect, featuring the few unlucky actors to be caught up in this mess finding themselves at the mercy of various CGI-augmented spirits whose appearance has been crafted in the most ordinary way.

The script is poor and the direction worse, with none of the creative people involved failing to make anything of the premise. It says much that my memory of the film is already fading, at a rapid pace, a mere 24 hours after I watched it. Gabrielle Anwar (THE TUDORS) fails to bring life to a rather stiff and uninteresting lead character and seems to be trying to get her American accent right rather than delivering a decent performance. Forest Whitaker (PHONE BOOTH) appears slightly befuddled and is probably wondering what he's doing caught up in this nonsense.

Because this is nonsense, I'll make no bones about it. Every haunted house cliché in the book is played out, from the restless ghost of a kid (a little blonde girl, of course) to the vengeful spirit with the scary eyes. The jump scenes are predictable as is the rest of the plot and the effects are poor, taking you out of the movie every time they pop up. A dismal effort, this.

"The Marsh" works as a typical, haunted house story. There are those that have criticised it, but really, what did you expect? Starring Gabrielle Anwar. WHO? Oh, that pretty french girl who was in that submarine movie. Right. It's a B-movie, people! So don't expect too much and you may be pleasantly surprised. Forest Whitaker, pre-King of Scotland, provides a shot of star value and basically holds the movie together. The special effects are good and the best thing about "The Marsh" is that's so pretty! The house is pretty, the female lead is pretty, hell, even the ghost is pretty! Its like a Normal Rockwell painting that's been messed with. Quite cool, just check your brain at the door and you'll be fine. :)

A Halloween movie--not terrible if you actually watch it on that Holiday, with a few drinks, as you do other things.

Not an amazing or terribly original film. Smooth and seamless special FX.

Forrest Whitaker does a very fine job...with what he is given screenplay-(and direction)wise.

Just don't expect to be amazed by the plot and execution.

No one who worked on this project should be shattered if some viewers notice that it was done for the money.

Nothing wrong with that.

Entertainment.

I saw this film at Frightfest in London and it was by far and away the worst film that I saw over the weekend. Everyone that I spoke to at the festival agreed that it was a stinker so I'm not sure who posted on here giving it 10/10 and saying it was awesome?! Can you spell PR agent? On the plus side the effects were good, the direction wasn't bad and the acting was generally sufficient (given what they had to work with).

On the down side was everything else. The plot was clichéd, hokey, difficult to follow and incredibly boring! The dialogue was amateurish at times and generally cringe worthy throughout. Worst of all (and this is clearly the cardinal sin of a horror film) it wasn't remotely scary. Even the occasional BOO! would have been appreciated... but no.

The director is young and seemed like an affable young chap who I'm sure will progress in the industry. He will look back on this with embarrassment (if it ever gets released, fingers crossed not). He did seem like he'd had budget and studio constraints as evidenced by the fact that when I asked him the likely rating of the film in the Q&A after the screening he replied, "y'know... PG-13... gotta keep it marketable".

That summed up the extreme rubbishness of this film. Billed as a supernatural thriller it's preternaturally dull. If you want to see a half decent film of this type check out something like "Skeleton Key"... and if anyone thought that was bad (which I didn't, but I know it has its critics) then woo... really don't go and see 'The Marsh'!

***Contains Spoilers*** I can't quite believe the previous review. I have also just seen The Marsh at London's Frightfest and I and my friends were wholly unimpressed.

It feels like another film in a long line of by-the-numbers supernatural thrillers that have come out of Hollywood in the last five years such as Stir of Echoes, Hide and Seek, Secret Window, The Sixth Sense, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Skeleton Key, The Mothman Prophecies, Bless the Child, The Forgotten, The Others etc, etc (Some of these films are quite good, but you get my point)

I have become very bored of creepy houses (this one was particularly un-imaginative) creepy cornfields, creepy little girls in night dresses, creepy dolls and scarecrows, creepy children's drawings, creepy children's songs, windows blowing open in gusts of wind etc, etc

It is also frustrating when EVERYTHING vaguely frightening is accompanied by a thunderous drum beat, even things like a shot of a child's teddy bear hitting the floor during a flashback! This device seemed to be the only means of creating any scares.

While this film was very professionally made it was very well-worn and tedious, with a series of flashbacks and revelations about something terrible which happened in the protagonist's past. The set in particular was not good and most of the flashbacks centered around a stained glass window in a door which was entirely modern and looked like it could be bought in any home improvements store.

The ultimate villain-ghost that is finally revealed to have triggered the events is actually just a rather misguided and pathetic character so when they came over all demonic at the end it rang really hollow for me.

The events themselves which triggered the haunting were, once again, rather unimportant yet predictable and wholly unoriginal.

A by-the-numbers money spinner in my opinion