- Actors: Jodelle Ferland, Neal McDonough, Sunny Suljic
- Director: Sheldon Wilson
- Format: NTSC
- Language: English
- Region: Region 1
- Number of discs: 1
- Rated: Not Rated
- Studio: ANCHOR BAY
- DVD Release Date: December 6, 2016
- Run Time: 96 minutes
It always makes
me laugh when a film tries to promote itself by what other films the executive
producer has worked on, as if the man overseeing the money has an artistic
control over the end product. This is what The
Unspoken has done with its marketing, as well as changing the film’s
original title (from The Haunting of
Briar House), plastering the names of films like Insidious and Paranormal
Activity over the cover of the DVD because of their vaguest connection with
this one. There may be some similar scares within this flavor of haunted house
tale, but the script is an absolute disaster which cannot be recovered from.
The film begins
with a haunting sequence that may have worked fantastic as a standalone short
film, heavy on style and mood before there is any need for narrative. A police
officer arrives at a house in the middle of nowhere and finds a number of
strange occurrences, including the complete disappearance of the family
residents. Every haunted house trick in the book is thrown at this first
sequence, which doesn’t really leave the film anywhere to go but down. After
this unexplained prologue, we jump forward in time over a decade, to the
arrival of a new family moving into the notorious secluded home.
This family is
single mother Jeanie (Pascale Hutton) and her derivatively mute son, Adrian
(Sunny Suljic), neither of which is at all concerned with the troubled history
of the home. In an unfathomable gap in logic, despite moving into a run-down
house that looks likely to collapse from a decade of neglect, there is more
staff hired to help out than there are members of the family. With a cook
(Rukiya Bernard), a handyman (Michael Rogers), and a babysitter hired to work
on the property, it is quite clear that screenwriter/director Sheldon Wilson is
stacking the deck with victims, regardless of the logic in their existence.
Sadly, the
character that is most illogical is also the film’s protagonist, Angela
(Jodelle Ferland). Angela is the babysitter hired to look after Adrian, and she also
happens to be the daughter of the nanny working for the family that disappeared
from the same house. While this helps to connect the prologue to the main
narrative, it also makes very little sense for Angela to take this job,
especially when the strange occurrences begin. So as soon as the film begins
picking up, it simultaneously stops making any logical sense.
There are
moments of inspired horror filmmaking within the movie, if only technically
speaking. The script struggles from start to finish, and the final twist of the
movie feels better suited for an episode of “The Twilight Zone.” That may not
sound half bad, but “Twilight Zone” episodes were only 30-minutes and didn’t
have such an unbearable supporting cast. Actually, there are a few surprisingly
good performances, however wasted the casting may have been. Neal McDonough is
a glimmer of hope in the casting as the local Sheriff investigating the events,
carrying out his scenes with subtle efficiency missing from the rest of the
cast. On the other hand, there is a melodramatic performance by Lochlyn Munro
as Angela’s father, which further makes McDonough feel too talented to be a
part of the cast. I won’t even mention the cliché caricatures of local
hoodlums, who break into the home in order to provide more idiotic victims to
the pile.
Entertainment Value:
6/10
Quality of
Filmmaking: 5/10
Historical
Significance: 3/10
Special Features: 0/10
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