Not as bad as the critiques claim

Rating: 8/10 (27 March 2013)

Though the film is scary it may not be enough to scare modern horror movie fans due to the lack of quantity of the scary scenes, however despite this I don't feel like this is a bad movie. Personally I can't find much fault with the movie, the story is very good and it clearly shows the concept from the original play and even though critics have given the film bad reviews because of the lack of scenes to make the audience jump I think the movie is good because of that, because it's the story which is scary and not the individual scenes. The one part of the film I was disappointed in was the ending, because I've seen the older film and read the play I already knew how it ended so it didn't effect me so much however for people who had not seen the older film or read the play the ending would have been predictable anyway because Jennet has a close-up where she tells the audience what she is going to do. This I feel ruined the ending.
The film is structured in a way so it builds tension to the finale of the film throughout the film the viewer will constantly be wondering how Arthur will solve this situation and escape without his family getting involved, the film does this by having Arthur not only haunted by the Woman in Black but also letting him learn about her past and making him come up with hypotheses on how to eliminate the problem. The purpose of the film is to make the audience scared when watching but more so to make them scared after they have watched it, I know this because of Jennet's speech saying she will continue her curse and that it will never be solved.
The way the individual scenes are structured in the film have certain effects because the audience know it's a horror film, for example the audience know that the large manor is going to be haunted and scary before they are shown inside however if this film was a different genre, say comedy for example the audience might not suspect the manor to be haunted and scary because we only expect that in a horror film. there are various other locations and sound effects which also trigger the stimulus of fear which normally wouldn't in a film that isn't a horror for example the crows or the Victorian dolls. Also in a film we are normally surprised or shocked when a character is killed off however we expect that in modern horror films its even not surprising if the main character dies anymore.
The narrative of the woman in black is very linear there are a few flashbacks to reveal a brief back-story of the main character and letters to give a back-story to Jennet however other than this the story is very straightforward, however the film doesn't follow a normal narrative structure. Normally the film will start with an equilibrium then in the middle this will be disrupted and in the end everything will be back to normal or a new equilibrium will be established however in the Woman in Black the film starts with a quick introduction of the characters and their situation then the main character travels to a haunted village. In the middle of the film the main character learns about Jennet and what she is doing to the children of the village and he tries to find a solution to the problem. At the end of the film the main character is killed and Jennet continues to haunt the village, so to sum up the story: Start- The Woman in Black is terrorizing the village.
Middle- The Woman in Black is terrorizing the village.
End- The Woman in Black is terrorizing the village.
This shows that the film does not alter much throughout however it seems like it does and the film seems to be progressing to something because we see it through the point of view of the main character.
The film doesn't have many characters however the characters that are in it do have a few key roles which serve a purpose in the story. A couple of characters fulfill the roles of Propps Character Theory for example the hero of the story is Arthur Kipps as he is the protagonist of the film, Jennet therefore is the villain as she goes against the hero. Then there are the smaller roles like Mr Bentley who is the donor as he helps Arthur with his quest to stop Jennets curse, then there is the dispatcher who is Arthur Kipps boss, Stella Kipps is arguably the princess because she is dead but Arthur does get her in the end, so to speak.
So to conclude, The Woman in Black is a good film and I would recommend people to watch it even if you're not a big horror fan don't threat because the film won't make you jump... much.