Not Bad At All

Rating: 8/10 (28 October 2013)

Kudos to the director for creating a horror film that has no gore, and none if those four letter words that we can live without! Plus, not nude scenes, or sex! Three cheers for James Wan! The story line is handled pretty well, which means that the film cutters made few mistakes. However, when it came to the script ... far too often there was far too much dialogue being rushed out of the actors mouths. That was very irritating! One very obvious example comes from Kyla Deaver, in the part of April ... she isn't a natural! Lili Taylor and Ron Livingston made a great husband and wife, but the realism of the family, all taken into account, was rather unrealistic. I don't believe there is a family in America that is as stable as this family was portrayed.
Lili Taylor is always good in these ghost movies, and she should have no problem playing in them for the rest of her life ... however, some of her acting was not up to par with Ron Livingson's! What a cool guy! Then we come to the most irritating part of the movie ... the Warren's constantly referring to why GOD brought them together. Once was enough! However, both Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson did a great job when the scripting didn't get in the way. Basically, when it came to most of the actors / actresses it seemed that they were in a tug of war when it came to who could speak the most words faster that the other, or whom could say more words than any of the others! It was very obvious, throughout the film that actors are always in competition when it comes to whom has the most lines! One mistake is when the Warrens are showing a film to their classroom. They tell the class if they look closely at the guy's eyes, they'd see drops of blood tearing in the man's eyes ... actually, the blood was flowing down the man's face, and had been wiped away before the Warren's finished their sentence.
Another mistake ... the cabinet knocking sounds was not always in threes. It was twice, at one time, then four times at another time.
However, even with all the annoyances, and mistakes, this film is still one heck of a good horror flick! On the other hand ... the ending was rather drab. I would have preferred to see everyone go back into the house, and the house blow-up ... with the witch laughing in the flames! But that's just me! I'm weird! I also thought that the Poseidon ship should have rolled over again at the end ... killing all of them. Now tell me ... if a ship is upside-down, in the water, with only its butt sticking up ... wouldn't it have gone down when you opened her up? Whatever ... this movie is still worth watching, and I've been watching it for a couple of days now.