Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
With the recent reopening of Hammer Horror’s crypt, cinemas are soon to be experience a steady deluge of classic British horror. The Awakening holds many of the Hammer hallmarks, but is not from the old Hammer catalogue; it is an original horror concept, something of a rarity to see in recent cinema, and even rarer to see done well. Rebecca Hall gives a scintillating performance, with superb support from an all-British cast in what is the best ‘ghost movie’ since Nicole Kidman’s ‘The Others’.
Independently wealthy cynic turned investigator Florence Cathcart has made it her mission in life to disprove the paranormal; in 1921, London was rife with people wanting to believe in the existence of ghosts following the heavy death tolls of the Spanish flu and World War I – indeed the opening roller asserts “This is a time for ghosts” – so Miss. Cathcart is never short of work,...
With the recent reopening of Hammer Horror’s crypt, cinemas are soon to be experience a steady deluge of classic British horror. The Awakening holds many of the Hammer hallmarks, but is not from the old Hammer catalogue; it is an original horror concept, something of a rarity to see in recent cinema, and even rarer to see done well. Rebecca Hall gives a scintillating performance, with superb support from an all-British cast in what is the best ‘ghost movie’ since Nicole Kidman’s ‘The Others’.
Independently wealthy cynic turned investigator Florence Cathcart has made it her mission in life to disprove the paranormal; in 1921, London was rife with people wanting to believe in the existence of ghosts following the heavy death tolls of the Spanish flu and World War I – indeed the opening roller asserts “This is a time for ghosts” – so Miss. Cathcart is never short of work,...
- 11/9/2011
- by Adam Rayner
- Obsessed with Film
Editor's Note: As a special treat for our London Film Festival coverage, I asked our correspondents Craig and David to share conversations about the movies that they happen to see together. Today, The Awakening, a new British horror movie. One of them likes it a bit more than the other, but they agree that Imelda Staunton's delicious supporting turn keeps you fully awake...
I know this place and I don't hold with any ghostly nonsense."
-Imelda Staunton as "Maud Hill" in The Awakening.
Craig: A 1920s lady ghostbuster? Spooky mansions? Antique trip-wire traps and knitted-character dollhouse terror? And a twitchy Imelda Staunton as a housekeeper in period garb, topped with some fusty-dusty wig work?? I was fine and dandy with this one despite its flaws. It follows a somewhat shopworn, well-haunted pattern of housebound horrors quite fashionable in recent years (The Orphanage, The Others etc). Director Nick Murphy...
I know this place and I don't hold with any ghostly nonsense."
-Imelda Staunton as "Maud Hill" in The Awakening.
Craig: A 1920s lady ghostbuster? Spooky mansions? Antique trip-wire traps and knitted-character dollhouse terror? And a twitchy Imelda Staunton as a housekeeper in period garb, topped with some fusty-dusty wig work?? I was fine and dandy with this one despite its flaws. It follows a somewhat shopworn, well-haunted pattern of housebound horrors quite fashionable in recent years (The Orphanage, The Others etc). Director Nick Murphy...
- 10/17/2011
- by Craig Bloomfield
- FilmExperience
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