Les Âmes silencieuses

THE QUIET ONES is another disappointing effort put out by the new and revamped Hammer Films. It's a generic science-team-researches-ghost type effort, obviously modelled on old-fashioned epics like THE STONE TAPE, yet the material is so sub-standard and predictable that it becomes very difficult to sit through, let alone enjoy.

The entire blame for the failure can be laid on the script, which took at least four people to write; four diverse folk who between them wrote everything from URBAN Gothic and RAMPART to THE UNINVITED and QUARANTINE 2: TERMINAL . Everything else is adequate APART from the script: Sam Claflin is an acceptable lead actor, and Jared Harris is pleasingly old-fashioned in his approach to his role. I liked the idea of the 1970s setting and the film-within-a-film type material is always fun.

Unfortunately, the story boils down to all the old possession clichés, and even a few ridiculous CGI scenes here and there (thankfully they're kept extremely brief). Attempts to build mystery are negated by having an exceptionally dull explanation at the end, plus one of those stupid last-reel twists It's hardly a wonder that Hammer have gone very quiet recently, as none of their new films are remotely like their classics of old.

A psychiatrist takes a team of people to a retreat with a mental health patient in order to help her. Part of the process is the conducting of a series of experiments which go terribly awry.

An initial struggle for me was how can a doctor be allowed to take a vulnerable patient away and use as a guinea pig; the ease with which it occurred, caused certain moral thrash. As the story moves on, certain inexplicable incidents occur with seem to trouble the entire team.

Of course these "incidents" have had to take place since this is after all a horror film. The events cause a certain split as the doctor in charge believes there is a naturalistic explanation behind it whilst some of the team hold the view that there is a transcendent reality beyond what we see, feel and understand.

On the whole, it is an effective horror film as the story progresses with good pace, upping the intensity with the passing of time. It is held back by a rather sense of predictability due to a highly worked story/theme (night/dark/silence interrupted by a sudden noisy intervention) and a not very believable initiating incident (the taking of a patient away for experimentation).

This isnt a bad movie. It just really irritates me when they purposely make the dialog barely audible so that you turn your tv up so you can follow the story. Then have all manner of loud noises to get cheap jump scares out of the audience. To me thats the biggest signal of a weak ass plot line or some other difficency the director or writers are trying to make up for. This movie is full of cheap jump scares with some real creepiness every so often.

The Quiet Ones is a new British horror movie from the makers of The Woman in Black. Produced by the classic crafters of horror, Hammer Productions, the film follows an Oxford professor (Jared Harris), his tutees and a student cameraman (Sam Claflin) as they attempt to both prove and document the theory that supernatural powers are simply a manifestation of psychological trauma. They begin studying a young girl who believes she is possessed by an evil entity, and a strange relationship begins to develop between her and cameraman Brian as the professor's attempts to create a poltergeist take their toll.

In an era where endless Paranormal Activity sequels, squeezing every buck out of the found-footage genre and reliance purely on cattle-prod jump scares, it's refreshing to see a horror film that seems to have been made by people who understand how suspense works. In the same way that Woman in Black tricked you into thinking that it's going to be a run-of-the-mill horror flick set in a creaky old house but did something interesting, The Quiet Ones uses the 'house in the middle of nowhere' setting in a way that doesn't just turn the lights off and throw furniture around when things go wrong.

While rare (but noticeable), there are still uses of very loud noises out of absolutely nowhere to accentuate the scares, but asides from that, they are achieved through realistic and unobtrusive special effects, a sparing but effective use of a rumbling, mechanical musical score (there is something to be said for music that can make a scene of occult research feel intense) and an unflinching refusal by the camera to shy away from the horror. The camera-work is an interesting mix of live-action and old celluloid stock filmed from the perspective of the cameraman as he observes the increasing number of bizarre and terrifying events unfolding before the investigators.

As far as performances go, Jared Harris is well cast as the physics professor slowly declining into madness in a knowing manner very reminiscent of classic Hammer-horror and Sam Claflin builds a lot on his brief performance in Catching Fire, creating a very believable character struggling with his own beliefs as the absolute horror of the experiment becomes increasingly harder to deal with. Olivia Cooke is also very good as Jane, the tortured subject of the experiment, taking a very over-used character (the silent, unblinking possessed girl) and doing something interesting with it, alternating between an almost comatose recluse and a young woman dealing with adolescence and emerging emotions.

The running time of just less than 100 minutes means that some of the character development feels a little rushed, but it means that the film has adequate time to set up scares, deliver on the suspense, and create an intriguing story without feeling repetitive. Taking unexpected turns, featuring good performances and inciting real fear in the audience, The Quiet Ones is a very welcome breath of fresh air in mainstream horror movies, proving once again that constant scenes of exorcisms and annoying families with camcorders have become tired old tropes and that the best thing to do is wipe that all away and focus on believable characters and more interesting methods to create a genuinely tense atmosphere.

When one of these films come out, and i categorise it because they are quite simply all the same at the core, i find myself hoping for something new, something shocking, inventive, anything to completely separate it from any other demonic/paranormal film out there. From the trailer this didn't give much away, which was a pleasant surprise. The story was there, yes, but it didn't feel the need to show any of its frightening tricks; rightfully leaving them up the sleeve where they belong. And i was left slightly intrigued by its mystique.

It was a good film, i enjoyed it, in ways it had its own unique vibe, but it is not enough to distance itself from the rest. The typical "jump" moments, where silence is replaced with a sharp, loud noise. The story is re hashed. Cults and Entities. The one thing it tries to do different is instead of just admitting that there is something wrong, the professor is adamant that the going ons are because of the patients mind. Things are flying about and going on fire because the patients mind did it.....

Jared Harris (Professor Coupland) and Olivia Cooke (Jane Harper) are the two who standout the most. The rest are fodder; displaying very poor acting and their characters where very tacky. The film does have its moments (T-Rex soundtrack) and it does have an unusual mellowness surrounding it, but unfortunately, it is just another routine horror.