Olhos do mal

I'm usually a fan of Spanish ghost stories but THE HAUNTING feels too familiar and derivative to truly be a success. It's another story about a married couple subjected to mysterious visions and hauntings in their own home. Unsurprisingly the Catholic church is somehow involved. The central character is the mother of a newborn baby whose post-natal depression seems to be having an effect on her mind. The film as a whole is very similar to THE BABY'S ROOM, a prior - and superior - Spanish effort released under a 'Films to Keep You Awake' banner.

As with many haunted house productions, THE HAUNTING is too dark and too slow for my tastes. The ghostly scenes make typical use of CGI effects and feel so ordinary that I wasn't scared once. The low key acting works in this film's favour and helps to bring some much-needed realism to the proceedings, but the events that play out are nothing special and I was often bored by the whole thing despite elements of interest in the back story.

Moving into a new house, a young woman learns that her increasingly paranoid reactions and psychotic breakdowns are the results of the lingering ghosts left in the house by it's concealed history from the Spanish Civil War and tries to end the curse left by that tormented history.

This one ended up being a surprisingly fun and decent Spanish haunted house film. One of the more enjoyable features found here is the rather fun and spirited storyline which manages to maintain it's sense of fear and thrills throughout here. The multitracked story manages to include a rather fun amount of thrills here by readily engaging the multiple storylines including the connection to the Spanish Civil War in the continuous newsreel footage or home videos showing the different treatments that befell all the prisoners which comes through well enough here to give this one the kind of setup for later. That backstory sets this one's best aspect, as there are some rather impressive hauntings here which make for a rather fun time when it starts to let them go in the middle half and the visuals that accompany them are a lot of fun. From her dreams and hallucinations of the ghostly figures in her bedroom taunting her by sleeping with her husband to the violent acts she believes she commits against her baby as well as the manifestations of the ghosts around the house, this one generates the appropriate atmosphere with plenty of creepy scenes. The other scenes, featuring the sounds over the baby monitors which ties the backstory into the ghostly actions plaguing the house, her hallucinations of the ghosts appearing as her children or the sounds of creaking floorboards or rattling doors, are far more traditional haunted house style shocks. These also help give this one a far more chilling atmosphere which helps to even out the religious imagery that gets incorporated into a rousing finale that evokes the best of the old-school burning-down-the-house styles so often employed before. This makes for a great ending and raises this one pretty high, although there are a few problems. One of the main issues is that it's too complicated for this type of haunted house story to make sense. This is a case of having way too much going on for its good, as there are three different backstories from the Civil War in the house, her backstory of the family troubles and the later talk involving the Church's actions here all being played out trying to piece together what's going on, and it eventually gets frustrating trying to keep everything straight. What also holds it back is that it has some rather troublesome CGI that looks bad here when it's being used despite not having a lot of opportunities, and although the film doesn't exploit it this stands out for the use overall. That said, it's not as bad as the other issues here.

Rated R: Language, Violence and Nudity.

It looks as if Spain ambitions to become the new Japan when it comes to unleashing atmospheric & convoluted ghost stories upon us horror-loving audiences. After the hugely successful "The Orphanage" last year (as well as "The Others", "The Devil's Backbone" and a couple of more earlier this decade), "The Beckoning" is already another brand new tale of the supernatural containing all the basic ingredients: ominous mansions with hidden attics, spontaneously appearing and disappearing ghosts, slowly revealing secrets from a distant past, suspicious links with the Catholic regime, characters who may or may not be dead for a long time already and completely unfathomable plot twists. I think we've all picked a rather skeptical attitude towards this type of films by now, as the vast majority of them unceasingly build up towards a climax that can't possibly live up to all the raised expectations. "The Beckoning" also somewhat falls into this category, but nonetheless it has a lot more merits than shortcomings. You certainly shouldn't expect a unique ghost-chiller that'll blow you out of your seat, but there's a fine balance between imaginative story lines and stylistic elements. In addition to the standard Haunted House fare, Elio Quiroga fascinatingly processed an authentic piece of obscure Spanish history into his screenplay. The No-Do's were a type of propaganda films, distributed by the Catholic Church during the reign of Franco, revolving on (manipulated?) miraculous occurrences and/or divine interventions. One specifically peculiar No-Do forms a very important part of the staring point of this film. The old No-Do reports about a Catholic orphanage were the Virgin Mary supposedly appeared and cured the ill. Several decades later, the large mansion is abandoned and the Catholic Church decides to rent it out. Pedro and his wife Francesca, who just gave birth to their second child, are very interested in the place and move in. Francesca struggles with a postnatal depression and is extremely sensitive to the gradually growing more mysterious occurrences in the house. She begins to have nightmarish visions, receive supernatural visits and discover hidden chambers that all indicating tragic and sinister events took place in the house rather than miracles. There are several more sub plots and additional story elements I could at, but they aren't all equally relevant and only raise unnecessary confusion. The scenes dealing with the mysterious No-Do movies are undoubtedly the best, but admittedly several of the spook-out sequences are admirably staged and moderately unsettling. There are, for example, rooms full of decayed old play dolls, creepy old nursery tunes and haunting images of deceased children. Nothing in this film qualifies as truly shocking and/or original, but I'm already very glad "The Beckoning" is never boring and overly sentimental. The conclusion is very satisfying, for once, albeit fairly predictable. Stylishly directed by Elio Quiroga, who previously made the oddly compelling and eccentric Sci-Fi/horror hybrid "The Cold Hour". Fans of European horror will also recognize leading lady Ana Torrent, as she starred in the Spanish 90's classic "Thesis".

Halloween evening and I was on flick two of Fangoria's FrightFest of which "The Haunting" was one of eight movies. To be honest, I'm a bit of a subtitle snob as I'm a very visual person and love to get totally immersed in the sound and images of a movie and hate reading. And since my Spanish does not extended to understanding an entire movie, I went with the English 2.0 sound of which there is an odd hollow phasing I presume is not in the original mix so be forewarned if this is the audio you are accessing. Despite that this is a chilling movie with some very effective special FX and a moving score. The use of the "No-Do" short docu footage works in well with the storyline. Performances are steady throughout. Again, it's the visuals including some nice cinematography that's most effective on this film.

Lately, Spanish cinema has toasted us with some interesting horror and thriller films. "The Orphanage" is an example that I can refer to and that I remember right now. So I was expecting more from this movie. The plot consists of the story of a family going to live in the countryside, to a house where a Catholic bishop lived. Of course, that house has a lot of obscure secrets, but this is quite evident from the start. Incidentally, the whole film is quite predictable and this spoils the potential pleasure of watching it. But the biggest problem is the amount of subplots that mix like the threads of a spaghetti, quickly causing such a confusion in the public's head that it simply loses interest in the story.

This film didn't create a continuous and growing feel of tension or discomfort, basing itself on scares to make "American style" horror. As for the actors, I don't know any of them, I'm not the greatest connoisseur of the actors in the country next to mine, but I felt that none of them stood out for the positive, even though everyone has done his work reasonably enough. Special effects and CGI seemed to me solid and decent.