At the end of 2012's Halloween season, my family got together for our annual Halloween diner. After we finished the meal and put my niece to bed, we gathered in the living room, lit candles, turned the lights off and watched this movie, The Woman In Black. It scared the crap out of all of us! I was going to post about it on my blog, but Halloween was coming to an end and I never gave myself a chance. Skyfall was right around the corner and I was putting all of my movie viewing excitement into the next James Bond opus.
I watched The Woman In Black again yesterday and realized I never reviewed it here and what a crime and mistake that had been. Especially since I'm the kind of Horror fan that is verry drawn to a real good and creepy ghost story. And boy, does The Woman In Black deliver in that department.
I love movies like, The Sixth Sense, The Others, and Ghost Story. Heck, I even love the more cheesy ones like House on Haunted Hill and The Haunting. There's something about the stories of spirits haunting the living that I appreciate slightly more than the tried and true, axe wielding homicidal maniac chasing a bunch of horny teens around in the wilderness. I'm always looking for the next chilling fright rather than the next blood, guts and severed head fiesta. Chilling freights are the focal point of this Edwardian ghost story has to offer.
Based off of the book and play by Susan Hill, the story follows a young widower as he is assigned by his law firm to go a creepy old mansion in an old town on the coast of England to take care of the paperwork of the recently passed owner. What the young lawyer, Arthur Kipps (Played by Daniel Radcliffe) eventually finds out is that the town is cursed and the mansion is haunted by the ghost of an angry spirit of a woman who lost her child in the muck of the nearby bog.
I wont give away the whole story, but I will tell you that this was one of the creepiest movies I have seen and absolutely love it for that sole reason.
Here are four reasons why this movie has a high level of creep-factor going for it.
1. It takes place in Edwardian England. Both the Edwardian and Victorian times are just creepy in general. You had people dressed in back all the time. Spiritualism and the first signs of paranormal investigations were hugely popular in those days. You look back at photos from those eras and everybody in them looks unnervingly stoic like their eyes are piercing the viewers soul.
2. The setting is quite unsettling. First you have this small, crusty township of frightened and seemingly superstitious folks. Then you have the huge, Victorian mansion itself, sitting in the middle of a seaside bog where the tide comes in at night and blocks off the only small road leading in and out of the property. The mansion also sports its own family burial ground upon its property. And don't all old Victorian English manors have their own cemetery? I'm pretty sure it's a law in the UK.
3. Ghostly children and their creepy old time toys. Again, I won't go too far into the story but, yes, there are a few ghost children in the film and ghost children are always creepy. Whether it be two twins staring at you in a hallway or some girl crawling her way out of a well, they scare the livin' bajeesus out of everybody. And I don't think I have to even start on the creepy old, wind up dolls that go off for no reason whatsoever. Monkey with the symbols, anyone?
4. The Lady In Black herself. The Grand Dame of this ghost tale is pretty simplistic in looks, but can still give viewers night terrors. When a pale woman shrouded in a mourning dress is viewed out of the corner of one's eye and then disappears, don't tell me that it's not enough to crap your pants a little bit. Of course the writers and director make sure she has some great pop-out moments that had the hairs on the back of my neck shoot straight up. And I don't use that term as a euphemism, that physically happened. It's science!
So if you're looking for a real good horror film this spooky season that truly scares you and you don't want to be grossed out, The Woman In Black is definitely Halloween viewing material. Especially with candles and pumpkins being lit as you only light source. You'll have nightmares for weeks.
In other Halloween happenings, some friends and I went on a moonlight ghost tour of downtown Milwaukee last night. We went last year, but we were hit with a downpour of rain that blew sideways and destroyed the umbrella I had brought. So we decided to give it another try this year with far better results. We didn't see any ghosts, but did hear of the old ghostly folklore of the Haunted Pfister Hotel where Joey Laurence as well as a few professional sports players got spooked. Another particular eerie story involved an woman shrouded in black (familiar?) who haunts the outside of an old church in downtown Milwaukee. A fun, if not chill filled evening was had by all. If you're in the Milwaukee area during the Halloween season and want to go on the tour. click here for more information.
And in tradition before I end this post here is another walkthrough of a haunted attractions called Reign of Terror located in Thousand Oaks, CA. This is last years show. Pretty impressive!
Them Park Adventure on YouTube
That's it for now. I'll try and find more Halloween high-jinx I can drum up or get myself into in the coming weeks. Stay tuned and stay vertical.
Zangz.
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