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At the age of
41, Marie returns to her home country,
Russia, to find out more about her biological mother.
She heads out to the old house in the woods that she's
just inherited, only to be greeted by her twin brother,
Nicolai who she had no idea even existed. However, the
family reunion is quickly interrupted when they realize
that the house is haunted, and that something, or
someone, wants them to stay.
Maybe I had set my expectations too high for mastermind
Nacho Cerdá's horror flick, The Abandoned, which was
the only movie from the After Dark Horrorfest to get
a real theatrical release (which was very unsuccesful),
but I was actually quite disappointed by this confusing
ghost story. While it does have a fairly original plot
and buckets of atmosphere, it never really gets going.
The movie got mildly suspenseful all ready after ten
minutes, but then it never went past that, it just
stayed mildly suspenseful throughout the entire process.
The movie revolves around Marie (Anastasia Hille) who
was adopted at a young age by an American family. She
now has a daughter of her own and has decided to find
out more about her biological family in Russia. Bad
idea. It seems as if the house where she was born is
haunted and wants her back. Together with her newfound
twin brother, they have to try to figure out a way to
get out of the house alive, but it's not easy when the
ghosts that are haunting them, are themselves. Does it
sound complicated? Well it is.
While the movie has a lot of potential, it gets tangled
up in its own story after a while and in the end you're
not really sure what's going on. And then there are a
bunch of scenes that contradict everything that's been
happening earlier. Sure, these scenes are eerie and
everything, but they never bother explaining for example
who Anatoliy was. I'm telling you, very little makes
sense, and that was the movie's main downfall. Then we
have the fact that the plot just doesn't seem to go
anywhere. The pacing is good and all but when it's time
for the movie to shine, it ends up feeling pretty
mediocre. Don't get me wrong though, The Abandoned is
indeed a good movie and I really did enjoy it, I had
just expected something much better after all the rave
reviews that it has received.
Ultimately, The Abandoned is a chilling and suspenseful
horror tale which will probably scare the shit out of
you every now and then, but it's too confusing and too
complicated to be the great horror movie that it could
have been. Had Nacho focused less on making the movie
complex and fill it with twists, I'm sure that The
Abandoned could have been great, but ultimately, I'm
sad to say that this was a pretty mediocre ride. Not
the best of the After Dark Horrorfest movies.
A gory leg wound and a gory body, not a lot.
For its intents and purposes, it worked.
Suspenseful and scary horror flick which unfortunately
gets dragged down by its own complication and ends up
being a confusing mess. Perhaps I'm just not smart
enough to figure out everything, but I'm pretty sure
that it was filled with plot holes. Maybe I should just
watch it again and then re-review it. I don't know.
A mediocre horror flick, but still recommended.
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