One hour of tension that fell apart at the end...

Rating: 2/10 (2 November 2013)

I watched this movie in a Film History class for Halloween, and while it was a fairly good movie, it did not live up to the hype of the 'use the facilities before you watch' or the 'this film is so scary...'. In my opinion, this film (as it stands) should be a drama, not a horror film. The number of scenes where I actually jumped in this movie can be counted on one hand, and I felt let down when I left, not terrified. The first half of the movie was mostly back-story and tension building, as expected, but the second half, instead of scaring the (expletive) out of me, dissipated then tension not with a murder or a huge scare, but with an uplifting, happy ending.
Short version of the second half: The mother (Laura) has been searching for her son for a year, and is beginning to believe in the ghosts that her son claimed to see. This drives the dad crazy, to the point of him leaving the house for 2 days, leaving her with the ghosts. She discovers that Benigna murdered all of the children after Tomas' death, and after playing "One, Two, Three, Konck on the Wall", the ghost children that she summons lead her to a secret door in the closet that leads to a stereotypical horror basement, flickering light and all. The viewer thinks: "Major jump scare coming!" or "She is so dead...", but instead, in Twilight Zone fashion, she believes she has found her son (alive), and after a dizzying camera sequence, realizing he is dead, and that she killed him by shifting the poles in the closet. At this point it appears that justice has been served, and you can almost hear Rod Serling's voice in the background, delivering a 'Twilight Zone' closing line. Instead, she carries the body to the orphans' room upstairs, where she screams for her son back, and she gets her wish. She commits 'implied' (not shown) suicide, and the lighthouse comes on, and all of the dead children join Laura and her son's spirits in the 'afterlife'. During this ordeal, she drops a necklace that her husband gave her. Cut to: future dad comes back to house with flowers for their grave, and decides to explore house. At this point, you think, "Oh, that dad is dead, jump scare coming up!", but no, the dad goes to the same room, and finds the dropped necklace, and the film goes to credits.
Feel let down, huh? You should.
This film didn't have enough jump scare to be a jump scare movie (i.e., Insidious, Paranormal Activity). It didn't have enough gore to be a bloody horror movie (The Cabin in the Woods). And, it ended on an uplifting note, preventing it from being a 'Twilight Zone"-y, psychological horror movie. All in all, I would have to say that it should be a drama with a couple 'spooky' bits. This categorization as a horror film is a mistake, and it costs the movie big time. If this were called a drama, then it would probably be 6-8 stars. The acting, writing, and directing aren't bad, and the subtitles are surprisingly good.
Summary: Not a terrible movie, just don't expect a horror film.