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"The Attic" DVD
I'll confess to having
mixed emotions when I slapped "The Attic" into my DVD
player. The fact that it had someone from "Pet Sematary"
attached to it was definitely a point in its favor, but the last
time I saw something from Slamdance On The Road, The Other Side,
it frankly was not that great.
So now I'm looking
at it and wondering, for once, lightning will strike twice. But
in which direction?
The plot is almost
worrisome in its simplicity--just your standard class-X haunted
house story--with the wrinkle that only one person who lives in
the house can actually see any of the stuff that's going on. So
naturally, all the old questions of sanity and hallucination rear
their ugly heads. Most of the problems seem to center around the
attic of said haunted house, so that at least gives us a focus
to work with.
On the one hand, it's
good to see something so simple again. It's not very often that
we get a straight haunted house story, but then, can it provide
sufficient depth on its own to make it worthwhile?
The answer? Not so
much. It's not that there's not a lot to like about "The
Attic"--you can really see the gradual decline as the engine
behind the haunting takes force--it's just that it's really too
straightforward. It gets sort of predictable, especially if you
have a lot of experience with prior horror films. If you know
what you're doing, then you'll know what they're doing. You'll
get the feeling that you've seen this all before, and the worst
of it? In places...you already have seen it.
The ending is a hallucinatory
intermingling of images and plots--plenty twisty but at least
slightly confusing. It leaves more than a few questions unanswered,
but the lack of answers actually makes things a bit scarier.
The special features
include Spanish subtitles and trailers for "The Attic",
"The Other Side", "The Unknown Trilogy", "Hack!"
and "Night Junkies".
All in all, if you're
into haunted house fare then you'll find plenty to enjoy in "The
Attic", but for those who have experience in the genre, you
might be more bored than anything. Still, it's worth a rental
if you can't find much else good.
The
Attic
**
DVD
Directed
by Mary Lambert
Written
by Tom Malloy, Bob Reitano
Starring
Elisabeth Moss, Tom Malloy, John Savage, Catherine Mary Stewart
Produced
by Aimee Schoof, Isen Robbins, Tom Malloy, Russ Terlecki
R
2007
85 mins
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