[The Uninvited]
Plot:Anna returns home to her sister Alex after a stint in a mental hospital, though her recovery is jeopardized thanks to her cruel stepmother, aloof father, and the presence of a ghost in their home.

Cast:Elizabeth Banks, David Straithairn, Arielle Kebbel, Emily Browning.

My Thoughts:Uh......what?

Review:"The Uninvited" is another remake of an asian horror movie. This time "A Tale Of Two Sisters", Ji-woon Kim's 2003 horror film. In the movie, Anna Rydell (Browning), returns home after a stint in a mental clinic. She returns home to her sister Alex (Kebbel), who's also like her best friend. But things have changed since Anna's been gone, being commited after not being able to cope with the death of her and her sisters mother.

Her father (Straithairn), has a new girlfriend named Rachael (Banks), and the ghost of Anna's mom haunts her from time to time. Why is her mother haunting her? Perhaps...to warn her of the intentions of her new soon-to-be stepmother, who might have some wickedly deadly plans in place for Anna and her sister? Movies like this really work on a few levels, admittedly. They set up a sad, tragic story, and put two pretty young girls in the female leads.

You automatically sympathize and empathize with their tragic lives, and want them to be able to put it all back together. But when the writer decides to just steal other peoples film endings, well...you can only take so much. Kebbel and Browning play their roles as Alex and Anna very well, and have good on-screen chemistry. But the movies scares, which is what you really pay for based on the trailer...are just not there. No surprise here, considering alot of these movies advertise scares which in the actual film, turn up empty.

This is not a scary movie, let me make that clear. Unless you're a 13 year old girl, it's not scary. If you're a 27 year old young man such as myself, you're really just watching to see if it can be chilling in a few spots, and have an atleast halfly decent story. This movie sets up the story nicely, but doesn't deliver because it's so predictable. We know going into the movie that new stepmom is evil, we know that the sisters are eventually gonna come to blows with her at some point, and we know that there's a ghost that's gonna pop up from time to time, and might enter the fray to lay the smackdown on stepmom Rachael.

The film doesn't exactly go like that though, as there are two twists to this plot, but the twists are nonsensical at best. This is a movie that pretty much relies on Browning and Kebbel to carry it. Watching the two of them bond again on screen after Anna leaves the mental clinic, and watching them investigate their new stepmom...who may or may not be who she says she is, it's just a great chemistry the two of them have. This works for a majority of the film, as the story unfolds.

But again what we horror fans want are real, true, creepy, scary shit. Which is exactly what we do not get. The ghost, which is the ghost of Anna and Alexes mother isn't scary, and when another ghost makes an appearance, scaring the crap out of one of the films lead females...it is actually a creepeir moment then the films main ghost. A sidekick ghost upstages the films star ghost! Amazing! Yet sad at the same time. There really isn't much to this movie beyond Kebbel and Browning playing good girls really good, and Banks playing bitchy stepmom really well.

Banks is becoming a good actress in her own right, and one of her best moments in the film comes in a kitchen scene where her and Anna go from a tense moment, to a confrontational one. Also Banks characters has an "interesting" way of removing a roast from it's pot...which might give some cooks out there a few ideas while at the same time scaring the crap out of some menfolk. Directors Charles Guard and Thomas Guard film the movie really well, giving us crisp and edgy angles within the events unfolding on screen.

But at the same time, Craig Rosenberg and Doug Miro's screenplay is very weak in scares, entertainment value, intrigue, or terror. The movies finale is a mess though, to put it frankly. It's up to snuff in the first 15 minutes when Anna and Alex have it out with Rachael while Dad's out of the house. But the films "amazing revelation" about "everything" is hilariously bad. Just plain bad...and reminded me of atleast 9 other horror movies I had seen within the last two years.

It's a pretty easy ending to figure out, so you won't be confused. But you will be pissed off, disappointed, and quite frankly...will probably feel cheated by it all. "The Uninvited" is a ghost movie with top notch performances, but low rent scares. And in the end, it's 82 minutes of "nothing to see here."

Positives:Good performances by Banks, Kebbel, and Browning. Nicely shot movie, and decent dialogue. The first 15 minutes of the finale is filled with suspense.

Negatives:The last 15 minutes of the finale, including the twist ending all suck. A lack of entertainment value and real scares. The ghosts are a bust.

Overall:One and a half out of four stars.





( Talk about it in the Forums!)



( Back to the main page)