Tuesday 26 June 2012

Woman In Black Review

The woman in black is a horror film starring Daniel Radcliffe and Ciarán Hinds. The woman in black follows the story of Arthur Kipps (Radcliffe), a lawyer, who is sent to sort and organize a deceased woman's papers at her derelict, bleak mansion. 

I originally watched the stage production of the woman in black back in 2010 and absolutely loved it, I came out of the theater buzzing, as it was one such a simple story, yet ever so terrifying. Which is why I had high hopes for the Film- adaptation, hoping that i would once again feel that terror, that i experienced coming out of the theater. Unfortunately,coming out of the cinema, I was heavily disappointed, as this film could've and should've been so much better! I honestly think that this film could've been terrifying, but they completely mutilated the story creating a mess in which you didn't know whether to cry or (to be totally blunt) laugh! 

The beauty of the original theater story, is the simplicity of it all, its a simple classic and most importantly of all chilling ghost story. The film however is a mess, ruining the simplicity of the story, by making children the main centerpiece of the plot. Why they did this I will never know. This plot change completely ruined the film for me, every scene that included a child almost supplied light relief from the scares, for example their one scene where a child is standing next to the woman in black, its filmed as if the scene is supposed to be shocking, but its not, because the child just supplies relief making the scene completely ineffective and useless. 

Now this is Daniel Radcliffe's first role outside the harry potter series so he needed to deliver to show he could act on his own two feet. I can't quite work out in my head if this is a casting error, or maybe he's just a bad actor, but I found Daniel Radcliffes performance in this film, totally unconvincing. I didn't feel his fear when he was inside the house, i didn't feel his total bemusement when the villagers started to turn on him. 

At points this film does show genuine scenes of horror, but the acting of Radcliffe and the poor story-line cannot be ignored. This film is my biggest disappointment of the year so far. I'm not going to give this film an awful score for the simple reason that I love the play and the original story. So if your thinking of watching the film, don't... watch the play instead! 

50% Calum.Russell 

No comments:

Post a Comment