A horror film where the scary stuff slowly creeps up on you

Rating: 7/10 (29 November 2013)

This is was a refreshing watch even though the plot is pretty conventional, beginning with the age-old horror movie setup of a family moving to a new house with a dark past.
The film is quiet and subdued. Ethan Hawke delivers a great performance. The tension and atmosphere rise slowly and effectively, the plot thickens and the stakes rise so high you start to sweat. There are not many jump-scares, the horror slowly creeps up on you. The scariest thing in the film is definitely the footage of home video tapes with murders recorded on them (fake of course, the film is entirely fictional, but it looks very convincing and horrifying and will stick with you).
The film has a cool story and a cool ending but the plot does fall a bit short when the time of the reveal comes. When you find out what it all was about you go: "oh, that's all it was?"