It was a dark and stormy night…what better night to see an atmospheric scary movie? Thus Thursday evening found me with James and Jeff at Skeleton Key. The brief synopsis of the story is that a hospice worker moves in with an elderly couple in a decrepit, backwoods Louisiana home to care for the wife’s ailing husband. Upon arrival she is given a skeleton key that is said to open every room in the house. Late night sounds from the attic quickly make her aware that her key does not open every door in the home and from there the mystery ensues.
Contrary to my usual style I will give a rating right up front: this movie is, at best, a 2 out of 4 star film. This film falls into the same “horror” category with movies like The Others or The Gift. It is a suspenseful, mysterious, atmospheric film not a “jump out” or slasher film like so many others in this genre. I have been known in the past to rail against critics who do not seem to have the ability to review a film on its own and frequently compare it to other films. This time I am guilty of the same transgression because as I watched I could not help comparing it to The Others, a film I love and a film that does this type of horror to perfection.
Despite the 2 star review there were things that I absolutely loved about this film. The cast in this film is very small and with the wrong choices for actors could have been dreadful. Fortunately the cast was terrific. I’ve enjoyed Kate Hudson in every movie of hers that I’ve seen and this is no exception. While the material doesn’t stretch her acting ability I found her believable and she did a good job of drawing you into the mystery as it was unfolding to her character. Gena Rowlands does an excellent job playing the slightly sinister elderly Southern matron. John Hurt, who I enjoyed immensely in Hellboy, has a rather thankless role here as he is mostly in a vegetative state throughout the film but he does it very well. I also enjoyed Peter Sarsgaard as the elderly couples’ attorney.
Like The Others this was a slow building suspense film, creepy from the beginning but done in a deliberate, unhurried fashion. I enjoyed this aspect as well. I appreciate intense, fast-paced suspense films but there is just something about a slower paced mystery that reminds me of the ghost stories I used to read as a kid. The setting was perfect. The decaying plantation house in the backwoods of Louisana, surrounded by swampland and trees dripping with foreboding was the best haunted house I’ve seen in a long time. The film was lit to intensify the sense of isolation and there were some incredible camera angles and shot selections that really intrigued me and added to my enjoyment of the film. Among my favorites were views through keyholes and shots from inside of old, antique door locks as the key turned to open them.
I like collecting old keys. Whenever Mary and I are at antique stores we look for interesting old keys that we use to place around our home or to decorate gifts. I’ve always found these old keys to be interesting and creepy and the symbolism of the skeleton key was used with great effect in this film. I also found the the part of the storyline related to old folk magic and Southern mythology very interesting.
There were some truly great things about this film. Why then does it only rate 2 stars? To be honest, that is hard to pin down. The climax was slightly anti-climatic after the earlier suspenseful build-up. But even with that the denoument wasn’t horrible. I think what I disliked most is the way that the writer tried to flesh out this story. A usual complaint with horror films is that they have no substance and there were elements in this story in which they tried to imbue the characters with more dimension and it distracted from rather than added to the story. For example they spent unnecessary time giving Kate Hudson’s character Caroline a reason for being a hospice worker. She had an unreconciled relationship with her father and he died suddenly and alone. While other movies might have benefited from this type of backstory it really did nothing for this film. Another example was the ending. There was a definite place where they could’ve ended the film after its sinister conclusion. Instead the film maker chose to tack on an extra 5-10 minutes to give the viewer an idea of what happened to the characters after the climax. It was unneccesary.
But more than anything my reason for rating the film as I did was that they did so many things well early on that made me feel like I had found another film that I would like as much as I like The Others and in the end they were not able to pull it off. Forgive me for becoming the type of critic that I loathe!
When this comes out on DVD I will no doubt sit down with Mary on another dark and stormy night as I think she would enjoy it but I cannot recommend spending money at the theatre for this film. I can highly recommend a visit to the website, which has a nice eerie quality to it.
