That Familiar Feeling
As a child David Ash (Aidan Quinn) lived at Edbrook Hall with his twin sister and parents until the incident where his twin sister died when she fell onto a rock and then in to a river, drowning. It led to the family leaving and heading to America but also to David in to becoming a debunker of the paranormal as he has been plagued with encounters of his dead sister. Twenty three years later and now as a published expert in exposing psychic phenomena as fraud he finds himself back at Edbrook Hall at the invite of Nanny Tess Webb (Anna Massey who is haunted by ghosts. On his arrival he is met by the beautiful Christina Mariell (Kate Beckinsale) who along with her two brothers lives there. But whilst David believes that Nanny Webb is a very disturbed woman he is just as disturbed by the closeness of the siblings especially as he grows close to Christina. But is all as it seems?
Things which go bump in the night seem as likely to be siblings in bed together in the movie "Haunted" as they are ghosts. It is one of the things which you are likely to remember after you watch "Haunted" that this is a movie which features an incestuous storyline involving a sister and two brothers. Unfortunately I don't think you will remember that much more because not only is "Haunted" short on horror thrills but is also pretty obvious and you can spot the twist quite early on if you are observant.
Now I am not going to go in to details or reveal anything but I will say that when a certain something is revealed you will be thinking back to earlier scenes and be looking to spot the flaws in what is being suggested in this story. But as I said early on you can assume a certain something if you are paying attention and if you spot what is going to happen then the movie has lost its big moment, it big catch and the movie becomes all about what will happen after that happens.
None the less "Haunted" is a nicely put together movie with a decent look, nice pacing and decent acting. The trouble is that with this being a movie set in the late 1920s and a product of the mid 90s it has a stiff style which makes it frequently feel stiff and drawn out. In fact at times I almost wondered whether "Haunted" was trying to deliver a 1960s style horror movie as it had that old fashioned tone which to be frank does little for me.
What this all boils down to is that "Haunted" didn't do a great deal for me as whilst it isn't a bad movie it is an ordinary one, stiff in its styling and actually quite obvious to what is going on if you pay attention to the people in the scenes.
