The Uninvited
Very few horror movies are convincingly made a la the Hitchcock master pieces. But ‘The Uninvited’ is really well made and quite convincing. Set against the back drop of a large New England house complete with long corridors, lonely attics and menacing gables, it’s just the perfect setting for a horror flick. Every camera angle screams fear of the unknown.
The directors want the audiences to teeter on the brinks of fear thinking about the evil lurking in those shadows. The lighting is done to perfection with the shadows and the sun blending to create a mysterious ambience. The cinematography has the tell tale signs of a horror flick. A lonely car being driven along dark road with trees casting their evil shadows all over.
The main characters are Anna played by Emily Browning, her step mother played by Elizabeth banks, David Strathairn as the dad, Arielle kebbel as the older sister, Alex. The casting is very appropriate. Emily Browning doesn’t look a day older than 14. Elizabeth Banks and David Strathairn are a perfect combination of menacing at one moment and amiable at the other.
Anna’s character comes with a troubled background marred by her mother’s death . The evil step mother convinces her that her mother was deliberately burnt to death. The first cringing moment for the audience comes within minutes of opening. The movie starts with Freudian antics like dream analysis, blood oozing out of keyholes and talking corpses. Emily manages to make Anna character very real and makes the audience live every moment of the script with Anna.
The Guard brothers have done full justice with the script of their first movie. The screen play is very well written and keeps the audiences glued to the screen. You can’t anticipate what’s going to happen next. The opening of the movie sees young Anna finishing her stay at the psychiatric clinic under the care of a paternal Dr. Silberling and her dad walks in to take her back home where his girlfriend played by Banks is waiting to welcome the hapless Anna with her false friendliness at one moment and motherly commands the next.
Enter Alex! The sister Anna has been yearning to see. The sibling chat is followed by a dive off the boat house. When the girls are enjoying the swim; Matt, the kid who went a bit too far with Anna when they were cozying around the beach campfire appears with his grocery boat. Just then Anna sees the ill fated boat house which was turned into a sick house for her mum and where her mum had burnt to death on that fateful night of the campfire. The rest you will have to watch for yourself. It’s a must watch for all horror movie fans. It’s a movie that will creep you out and give goose bumps through out
Directed by: The Guard Brothers
Rating: 3/5
Cast: Emily Browning, Arielle Kebbel, David Strathairn, Elizabeth Banks, Maya Massar, Kevin McNulty, Jesse Moss, Dean Paul Gibson, Don S. Davis, Lex Burnham, Matthew Bristol, Danny Bristol
Posted on Tuesday, February 10th, 2009 at 8:55 pm