The Awakening
2011 Directed by Nick Murphy
Synopsis
Sometimes dead does not mean gone.
The Awakening is a British horror thriller film directed by Nick Murphy, starring Rebecca Hall, Dominic West, and Imelda Staunton. 1921 England is overwhelmed by the loss and grief of World War I. Hoax exposer Florence Cathcart (Hall) visits a boarding school to explain sightings of a child ghost.
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**This review contains potential spoilers about the BBC special Ghostwatch**
Back in 1992, Stephen Volk wrote a television play for the BBC called Ghostwatch, it was, and still remains, one of the most controversial programmes ever broadcast on British television. Ghostwatch was a mock-documentary about uncovering a hoax surrounding the ‘most haunted home in Britain’ yet what the filmmakers discover is anything but fake. Nearly twenty years later Volk returns to this theme, albeit as a period piece rather than a contemporary horror, as a rational non-believer is confronted with the unexplainable. And much like Volk’s earlier work, The Awakening also descends into farce thus undermining what went before it.
The rational vs. supernatural has been a common theme throughout…
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One of my biggest problems with supernatural horror is the Fuck You, Science issue, which I also talk about here. I’m fine with fantastic films throwing laws of logic and physics out of the window - hey, if you say ghosts exist in your movie, or that a girl can survive tunring her head through 360° if she's possessed by the Devil, I’ll go with that. I may not believe in ghosts, but I’m not so set in my views that, like Richard Dawkins, I can’t watch Freaky Friday because I have no concept of self outside my body. That’s an actual thing he says in The God Delusion. Yes, it’s fucking stupid.
The problem arises in that supernatural horror…
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Ghost stories have always been a part of cinema. Ranging from the 1961 classic The Haunting all the way up to something like 2001’s The Others starring Nicole Kidman, they have always been eerie experiences for the general viewer. Normally flooded with a dark atmosphere, strange occurrences and terrifying sequences, I've always had a vast interest in the genre. Despite all the clichéd garbage we've seen over the last decade with things like Paranormal Activity and its multiple sequels somehow scaring the audiences, ghost stories have successfully managed to reinvent themselves in a positive fashion in the last five years or so. The Devil’s Backbone is a great example of this. Whilst I’m not a massive fan of it, Del…
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A largely cerebral and exceptionally chilly film. That said and covered, this film is what The Skeptic SHOULD have been.
Florence is a ghost hunter and occult debunker of the early 1900s, who finds herself at a boarding school for boys with a real ghost that she refuses to accept and a slew of crazy staff that refuse to accept her.
As the film walks forward it goes from modest and moderate to increasingly furtive and dark. Its run time is relatively brief, so it paces out nicely. The sets are nicely put together in an austere manner, which fires off very well with the washed out color pallet.
The film is well cast, sharply written, and has a couple…
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The performance of Rebecca Hall is what escalates this above a standard ghost story. Other than her, this is a pretty standard film. The drab colour palette works well for the film and there are a few shots that reveal a surprisingly adept cinematographer. On the whole it is rather slow and at times predictable but Hall makes it enjoyable enough.
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You get to see Rebecca Hall's left boob, which was a pleasant surprise.
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This movie is so very ALMOST. It does some things very, very right but has a few big misses that kept me from really loving it.
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This review reportedly contains spoilers. I can handle the truth.
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is she dead yes or no?!
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Jumps, stacked tension, a great look, worried faces, and plenty of modern ingenuity in a period setting: The Awakening is what you'd expect from a solid horror film, but nothing more.
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Una pelicula que definitivamente no me llamo para nada la atencion, si es verdad que al final se pone un poco mas interesante, pero nada, no tiene mucho este film.
Se puede decir tambien: Aburrida.
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I've seen a bit of negativity to this, usually directed at the writing and its 'convolution' but I felt nothing of the sort I was too busy tensing and clinging on to my blanket. Effective use of horror commonalities but without being average, over-the-top nor annoying. Its pacing is what keeps it working as it starts off boldly, slows it down to settle you, amps it up and repeat to a tense third act that restarts the cycle effectively. It's an effect that can be laborious but its crafting has kept it on a track that terrifies, shocks and interests thanks to the performances especially with Rebecca Hall standing out; committed entirely to the role, keeping it plausible and held-back instead of the usual melodramatic overacting that actors have been known to bring to horrors. I really did love it.
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Thought this was swell-intriguing story, great acting and some genuine scares.
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Excellent period ghost story. While the "skeptic discovers the supernatural is real" angle is still horribly tired and obnoxious a theme, there's more emotional depth this time around, even if the attempts to transform the story into a quasi-mystery never really gel.