For some reason, Wife M and I like horror movies more in the summer than the winter, perhaps because the winter is so gloomy and gray it is hard to escape it with a gloomy movie… Switching gears a little bit, I had high hopes for Annabelle creation, having liked The Conjuring and Annabelle so much. We bought tickets for opening day And counted down the days. It was not a perfect movie (some cliches such as isolated farmhouses, scarecrows, etc.), but very enjoyable and entertaining, and certainly met my expectations and was a worthwhile investment of time and money. The fact that so much of the scares took place at night after everyone went to bed was on my mind that night when I got up to get a drink of water 🙂
Ghost MOvies
The Movie “Dark Water” not my favorite
Watched Dark Water, a Japanese ghost film where a newly divorced mother and her young daughter move into a building haunted by the ghost of a girl who drowned there. It felt a little long, a litte slow, a little predictable and a little unreal (e.g. Where were the neighbors in their building?). Very meh. 😦
Thought “Lake Mungo” was slow
We watched Lake Mungo, which is a ghost movie that had a good rating for ghost movies on Flixster (over 90% critic approval, and 65% user approval). The film is a documentary-type movie that documents a family’s situation following the drowning of their 16-year-old daughter. Honestly, I had high hopes for the movie, but it was a snoozer. Every time a hint of drama started to build, the movie would dismiss it (e.g. the dead girl appears in a picture, then the brother admitted to fixing it; their was a medium who had nothing happen during the seance, etc.). There was one brief moment of creepiness — when the daughter’s cell phone seemed to capture an image foretelling the daughter’s death — but otherwise it was just a long, slow film, not unlike the Amy Winehouse documentary we watched last year. Bleh.
Loved The Pact!!
We watched The Pact, and loved it is a ghost movie. It has a creepy twist and the movie is as much a mystery as it is a horror film. It has an indie feel to it, has some unusual twists and is a thriller. I loved the lead in it, who is also great in Mad Men, and who reminds me of Savannah, who used to work for me.
Watched “Stir of Echoes”
Am continuing my annual September trend for watching Ghost movies, and watched Stir Of Echoes, a 1999 film starring Kevin Bacon. It was okay (i.e. fair), a 2.5 out of 5 star movie as far as ghost movies go. A little bit hoakie in parts, and fairly tame as far as ghost movies go, but it had its moments. Why wasn’t it higher? It was missing an intangible “it” quality that detracted from the atmosphere. It had almost a made-for-TV type thinness to it. But it wasn’t awful, although I probably won’t watch it ever again. (In the movie, Kevin Bacon is hypnotized by his sister-in-law, and comes out with the ability to see ghosts. He sees a ghost in his house and is compelled to solve the mystery, which has a minor plot twist at the end. The movie is a kinda combination of sixth-sense, flatliners and Lady In White).
