A family on the brink of destruction trapped in a horrorific inevitable nightmare

Rating: 8/10 (26 June 2018)

I was very nervous to see this movie as I had read all the reviews prior to my viewing of this. Many claimed it to be as scary as The Exorcist and that this film had very disturbing images that would stay with me. I can say that it got half of it right.
This isn't a typical horror film that relies on jump scares that you know are coming. The horror really comes from the tragedy of a family that breaks down due to circumstances that occur in their lives. Yet this is what makes it feel real as it could happen to any of us. The feeling of loss, the blame that occurs in tragic events and the process of grieving is all captured.
I won't say much about the plot other than Annie (Toni Collette) and her family recently have lost the grandmother of the family. Annie mentions at her funeral that she was a private woman and that there were some conflicts in the family and the relationships were strained. Annie eventually starts to discover more about her grandmother's life which leads to more discoveries than she probably wanted.
The performances in the film are terrific overall. Toni Collette portrays all sorts of emotions from anger, devastation, horror and sadness flawlessly. She is her finest in this film and the dinner scene just shows her acting abilities. Really hope she gets an Oscar nomination for this role.
The film slowly builds up a sense of dread and despair that doesn't let go at all and it makes you feel uncomfortable. The first hour of the film can feel like it goes quite slow and this may put off some viewers however it really makes you get emotionally invested in the characters. Thus seeing their pain later on makes it that bit more devastating.
The ending was a little bit disappointing, maybe not because I saw it coming, maybe because it gives you the answers in a spoon fed way. A bit more subtlety might have worked better.