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Overall Rating : 4.5/10
Directed By : Elio Quiroga
Ana Torrent
Francisco Boira
Héctor Colomé
Rocío Muñoz
Supplied By : Phase 4 Films
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : July. 28, 2010
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| PLOT Francesca is a young pediatrician who has been traumatized by the loss of a child through crib death. When the family moves to a new home in the country, supposedly to help her recover from the experience, she begins seeing completely inexplicable things. The house in which they now live seems to hide terrible secrets. Both the cellar and the attic are locked and barred to the family - and it is from both of these places that Francesca receives nocturnal visits that are slowly driving her mad. |
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| THE REVIEW In the film THE HAUNTING the story revolves around a pediatrician named Francesca, who has just recently given birth to a baby boy. To get away from the city life, Francesca and her husband Pedro who is also a doctor, along with the baby, and their young daughter move into a new home. Their new home, which used to serve as a school for young priest, is spacious enough for the young family, so they seem to settle right in - that is until Francesca gets a little impatient. It seems as if since the baby's birth that she has developed a bit of postpartum depression and doesn't want to spend a minute apart from the baby - symptoms that husband Pedro is growing tired of. If this isn't enough, Francesca also begins to experience strange noises and occurrences in the house during the night. Both Pedro and their psychiatrist friend Jean suggests that these experiences are due to Francesca's depression and recommend time away from her new born. With everyone on her case, Francesca as well as their young daughter continue to see apparitions, most importantly of young girls. Much to the chagrin of Pedro, Francesca eventually enlists the help of Father Miguel a Psychiatric priest how actually believes Francesca sue to the house having a very colorful past. Without the knowledge of the church, Father Miguel opens up a top secret vault of old news reels known as "No-Dos(pronounced "No-Doe), which were news reels oi Spanish current events created to play in theaters for locals. But buried deep with in these files are a few reels that were banished from such showings and were to been seen only by the eyes of the higher ups in the church. One such reel documented a story in which a gifted prostitute had the ability to heal the sick, another was a sighting of the Virgin Mary brought forth by a group of young Catholic girls, an lastly told of some mass sacrifice cover up harvested by the church Such stories were diverse, but it just so happens that each of them all occurred in one location, the very home in which Francesca and Pedro have moved their family. With the unearthing of these hidden secrets, Father Miguel angers the evil that lingers within the home, it's an evil that only he can cast out, but it may also mean that he may have to sacrifice his own live to save the others. In closing out my coverage of the 8 films that make up LIGHTNING MEDIA and FANGORIA's FANGORIA FRIGHTFEST, THE HAUNTING(AKA NO-DO) from Spanish Director is the film that I chose to take on last. Why you may ask? Well the answer is simple really, in that I figured that it would be my least favorite of the bunch, Firstly, it's very generic English title, THE HAUNTING, which as been given to like a million other films before it, just didn't get my curiosity going, I mean, a movie about a haunting, how original could that be. Well, as I finally sat down to check this one out, I found out the answer to that question. To put it simple, THE HAUNTING itself is very simple, in that it consists of a wife who hears bumps in the night, yet her hard of hearing(apparently) husband doesn't. Things continue to go on and get stranger by the night, and as this occurs the more and more the husbands disbelief grows, and of course he believes his wife is crazy. And then as it always goes(well almost), a priest intervenes and eventually casts out the evil, and then so on and so forth. I know that this seems to be all by the numbers ghost story fare, but THE HAUNTING does offer up some decent original ideas of it's own. The most prominent being the use of the old "No-Do" news footage through out the film. Made to look some 50+ years old the footage is presented in an eerie vintage and scratchy appearance. This footage is quite effective in creating a dark and eerie mood, and does so from the beginning, and then many other times through out the film. Another thing is that the film uses the young daughter Rosa as sort of an "anchor" in which she is part of a twist that unravels later in the film that tends to help the story as far as being a solid one. Technically, THE HAUNTING offers nothing new when it comes to films of it's type(ghosts, haunts, and creepy little ghost children). But as for the film in general, it's not that bad I must admit after assuming that I wouldn't like it very much. It's scare setups are predictable, loud bangs, ceilings creaking, spirit sightings, they're all here, so before you go into it, you know exactly what you're in for. But as I said, it does add that creepy element of news footage that really gets you to wondering initally if you truly don't know what to expect from it. Originally shot in the Spanish language, because that is of it's origin after all, for it's US release via this FRIGHTFEST set, it is indeed dubbed over in English. As it often does, the English dub is sometimes comical (especially during the narration of the No-Do newsreels), but after you settle in and get used to it, it's not too bad, at least for me it wasn't. |
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| GORE
METER 2/10 Really light on the gore, there are, of course some graphic images and things such as throats being slit, but nothing major is shown on screen. |
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MUSICAL
SCORE 2/10 I honestly don't remember much of a score, but i'm pretty sure it was a bit on the generic side. Things like the newsreels would have cheesy vintage news type music to accompany it however. | ||||
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM THE HAUNTING is an ok thriller, but then again I can see why the film ended up being last in the voting poll. For one it is yet ANOTHER ghost story, and we have seen plenty of those in our theaters. Another reason may be, because of the dubbing. I for one didn't have an issue with it, but I do agree that the dubbing featured in the trailer, didn't help matters - instead it makes it appear worse. It's a very basic ghost story, that in the end leaves a few of it's loose ends a blur, but taking into account what I initially assumed of the film it's an ok watch. Each FANGORIA FRIGHTFEST film will be available through Blockbuster stores and Blockbuster By Mail, as well as digitally via Blockbuster On Demand for a full 45 days before they are available for purchase or rental through other national home entertainment providers.They then will be released on DVD, September 28, 2010 |
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