Book #8 – Harry Potter & The Woman In Black. Oh, this isn’t Harry Potter? Oh… I thought it was another series about Voldemort’s wife or something. The Woman In Black is actually one of the highest grossing horror films of 2012 so far. I’ve heard a lot of neat things about it, but wasn’t impressed enough to go see it in theaters. Thanks to my snazzy tax return, I went and purchased a bunch of horror movies. What recession? Anyway, the DVD cover is pretty cool and I hoped it would mean the actual movie itself was just as good.
The Woman In Black is directed by James Watkins (Eden Lake) and written by Jane Goldman (X-Men: First Class), based off the novel by Susan Hill. Tim Maurice-Jones (Revolver) is the director of photography and Jon Harris (The Descent 2) is the editor. The film stars Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter, obviously), Ciaran Hinds (who apparently played Dumbledore in Deathly Hallows Part 2), Sophie Stuckey (The Dark), and Roger Allam (V For Vendetta).
The first thing I need to get out-of-the-way is that the film is absolutely beautiful in terms of scenery, cinematography, and post production effects. A “period” flick is often more rural and natural than other films, but this really impressed me with the overall look. Yes, it was difficult to spot The Woman In Black in some scenes shot at night, but overall the picture is stunning. Lots of shots of the beach, lots of older styled Victorian houses, lots of fog filled forests. Also, it has a blue-ish tint to it, but nothing like what you’d see in Twilight.
The acting is all exceptional, but that can’t even save some scenes where things become…very boring. I think I skipped over the first fifteen minutes of the film because I was bored. Yes, they all act very well, but if there’s nothing going on, how are you supposed to keep an audience hooked. With a “period” flick you need more than just talking and moving to keep people interested, especially in 2012. I was hoping for a bigger performance from The Woman In Black, but she was kept more of a secondary character and didn’t have any lines or much of a back story developed except for her story, her urban legend.
Is The Woman In Black scary? No, not really, but it does contain a lot of good chills and things that would be scary had I not been used to horror film by now. A lot happens that I didn”t necessarily expect, and a lot of those things could be scary if you put yourself in the same place as the movie. Blood, gore, and sex? Nope, none. Just a lot of your typical ghost story gags and paranormal occurrences. I can’t really knock the film for that as it never really marketed itself as being this bloody, terrifying feature. I was just hoping for a little more chilling scenes than were delivered.
All things considered, I think The Woman In Black would have been much better as a short film. Not one of the five-minute ones, but one that’s maybe just an hour. I feel that would have been the best way to remedy the lagging scenes and lack of gore. But why would the film executives do that when they had Daniel Radcliffe starring? They knew he had a fan base that would go to see him, especially in his first post-Potter role. The Woman In Black grossed about $55,000,000 in America and about $72,000,000 in overseas markets. Not bad, but I would actually advise you to avoid this film if you’re not a rabid Harry Potter fan. It’s good, but it lacks a lot of the aspects you would look for in a great horror film.
