Michael's Movie Grade: C
A style over substance horror film.
In this film, a governess moves into a new house and determines to make herself a member of the family. Unfortunately, with her twisted mind she puts everyone in the house in danger.
Visually there is a lot to love about this film. The setting is lovely to look at and perfectly contrasts with the dark storyline. Yet even with the lovely surroundings the color pallet is never too brightly lit, given a sense of dread for what is to come. The camera angles are often very unconventional. Not only is this fun and playful but it allows us to see the story from our narrator's twisted mind.
The main reason to watch this movie is Maika Monroe's lead performance. She is perfect as this creepy over the top main character. As this character she commands the screen in every scene she appears in. She is simply a joy to watch, and this movie can be a treat simply because of her.
Unfortunately, the film's story is a bit of a mess. It borrows heavily from better films without adding much of anything. At many points the filmmakers are constantly giving us shocking images that are there for no reason except to be shocking. They add nothing to the story or characters. After so many of these pointlessly shocking images, they just get tiring and less effective. This leaves us with a hollow story and characters for what had ingredients that could have made a great horror film.
This movie had some promise, but it relies too much on cheap shocks to fully work.
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