Something truly rare, an artfully done scary movie (I need more than 15 words)

The Orphanage takes the tools of a scary movie and makes it something exciting and beautiful to watch.  I can't think of someone I would advise against seeing it.

How do you make a scary movie from standard materials but make it new?  Use a true art director, a cinematographer who costs more but brings much more to the table, and brilliant actors.  In short, actually give a crap.

Laura (Belen Rueda) spent the better part of her childhood in an orphanage before being adopted.  As an adult, she and her doctor husband, Carlos (Fernando Cayo) buy this abandoned somewhat spooky house to run a type of boarding school for special needs children.  They have an adopted son, Simon (Roger Princep) who is HIV+.  He is precious as any boy of about 9 should be.  He has imaginary friends who were truly imaginary.  He encourages his mother to tell a story of a pirate and treasure, so she does as they go to the beach where there is a cave in the cliff-side.  He goes in seeking treasure.  What he finds is at least one more “imaginary” friend.  This is where the spooky starts. 

Simon starts behaving strangely.  It appears that he creates a game of follow the clues with his mother.  It becomes oddly clear that Simon is following clues that he did not plant for himself and his mother’s game.  Apparently following the clues off by himself, he discovers that he is adopted and sick.  He becomes oppositional, not necessarily unexpected, then he disappears.  The house then becomes the standard haunted house where a medium is brought in at one point and so on.  Director Juan Antonio Bayona and writer Serigo G. Sanchez use most of the standard tricks and tools in the box marked “haunted house.”

I can’t say anything more about the plot; like I said, they use most of the tools.  The imagery of water and light and mild poltergeist activity are a bit heavy handed, but what stops them from being stupid is just how carefully they are filmed and presented.  They are heavy handed, but they fit the plot and pacing easily.  This is about the only negative thing I can say about this film.

The colors are rich.  The lighting creates shadows, but not in a way that fits the standard haunted story.  As often as not, the shadows are part of a layering effect to make the film beautiful to watch.  We have all been through so many haunted “something” stories that something new is nearly unthinkable, so the team decided to make it beautiful to see.  Also, significant amounts of the scary stuff happen in well lit places.  This does create something relatively new since the shadows can now not be trusted to hide the frightening bits which keep the viewer on edge in a way slightly different from those that came before.

I can see why someone would compare it to Pan’s Labyrinth.  They are both about children traveling a distance of some sort and being taken to a home that is unfamiliar.  They both cover the fabulous and there are some other plot comparisons best left unsaid.

The Orphanage would probably be worth watching even if the plot was run of the mill because of how carefully it was filmed, framed, and edited.  But the story is so compelling that it takes all the hallmarks of a thoughtless genre film and makes it something different.

Recommended:
Yes