Review of The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008) by Fallon O — 28 Feb 2009

I cannot begin to describe how misleading the trailers for this movie are, how poorly the writing was and how boring the movie is overall. I am guessing that this was put together off a synopsis rather than a script and the screenwriter was not certain where to put certain scenes. The acting was banal. The haunting was silly (and not a haunting), the secret plot twist at the end was not a twist but simply a surprise (and not a good one at that) and the "horror" of the movie made no sense. And this is a major problem for many recent horror movies: they lack an underlying mythology. The standards (e.g. mummies, vampires, poltergeists, zombies, etc) have their own back stories. That is why they are "standards". A movie can deal with the horror slightly differently than in the past (like in 30 days of night) but cannot go too far from the culturally agreed upon mythology without leaving viewers feeling cheated. Most of us can argue about whether silver bullets really effect werewolves and we all joke about zombies walking too slowly to ever pose a credible threat but, basically we all understand the "rules" regarding these creatures. Even with psycho killers (e.g. Jason, Michael or the guy from the saw series) there is a basic cultural understanding about how things are supposed to work. I am not talking about a formula. I am talking about an accepted cultural norom. This is why "The Grudge" did not play that well for a lot of people. Asian ghosts are different. Same with hidden wires crouching tech guy (or whatever that movie was called); westerners have their own "ninja" myths and flying is not part of them while (I am told) these are the superman and batman type heroes of the Eastern cultures and great leaps through the air is acceptable. For us, Spiderman can do it but not so much a Samuri.

My point is that a lot of horror movies appear to be made by people who do not understand this. â??Mirrorsâ?? is another good example. These movies have some scary (or at least gross) scenes and the standard sudden movement, suprise crap is used (of course) but, in the end, they are uninteresting because they do not play on our cultural agreement regarding ghosts and ghouls. In this movie we spend the whole time wondering (well, trying to get engaged enough in the movie to care) whether the poor girl is insane. There is really no question that she is not being â??hauntedâ?? (in fact, there simply is no haunting in this movie) only to find that she is part of some unexplained magical cult that dictated her fate since her birth (and I am Not spoiling it for you â?? trust me â?? the movie spoils itself). There is some religious symbolism thrown in without rhyme or reason (I guess you just have to have a cross or two) and some violent delusions but no haunting, no terror and no link to the accepted (un)reality of our shared and reasonably agreed upon, western myths.

In short. This movie, like so many others, falls flat on its face from the get go. In fact, the only redeeming quality it has, is that it is perfect for use as an example when someone is trying to demonstrate why â??The Changelingâ?? (the old one), and 'Poltergeistâ?? (and to a lesser extent - â??Friday the 13thâ??, â??Halloweenâ?? and those types of movies) were movies made by people who understood how to scare other people.

Do not bother renting this one.