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An
American Haunting takes place in the 19th
century and revolves around young Betsy Bell
who's having problems with a ghost who's tormenting
her. As the attacks gradually get more and more
brutal, her family starts to realize just how
serious this situation is. Is there any possible
way to stop this ghost?
The title for this movie, "An American Haunting",
is very suitable considering that this feels like
a mix of many other big American ghost movies.
It's got elements from "Poltergeist", "Amityville
Horror", "The Exoricst" and even more recent
ones like "The Grudge". But even though this was
incredibly unoriginal, it still had an interesting
story which kept you in your seat and it did have
its creepy moments.
While being far from as suspenseful as I had hoped
that it would be, the visual effects are absolutely
stunning and the photography is simply beautiful
which lifts this movie up a bit. Still, the fact
remains that this wasn't very scary and at times
it even felt more like I was watching a Hallmark
drama than a mainstream horror flick which kind of
bummed me out.
With a strong cast we naturally get some great
acting but unfortunately that doesn't really help
a lot since, just like in The Exorcism Of Emily
Rose, Betsy doesn't really have a strong character.
The directing is very average and just like with
the story, I thought that it could have been
taken in some more clever directions.
Ultimately I wasn't overly pleased with "An American
Haunting" as I had hoped that this would be a
classic ghost story. Instead, this felt like a
drama with some ghost elements in it which tried
too hard to be like every other ghost flick that
we've seen. I can see teeny-boppers liking this,
but for people who have had their fair share of
ghost movies, you'll probably feel like you've
seen this movie many times before.
Nope.
Standard stuff, feels like we've heard the same
score in many other horror flicks.
I really wish that I could have liked this more
than I did but it was just so unoriginal. And
while it did have its creepy moments, there just
weren't enough of them. Don't get me wrong though,
it's not a bad movie which it might seem like I
think, I just think that it's very average stuff
and I had hoped for something more than that.
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