RRP Lowest New Price £3.52

HBO Home Video Release date: Tuesday 12th of September 2000 Starring: Jean Marsh, Trish Van Devere, George C. Scott, Melvyn Douglas, John Colicos, Director(s): Format: Anamorphic, Colour, DVD-Video, NTSC, Region code: 1 Running time: 107 minutes Language: English (Original Language) Language: English (Subtitled) Language: Spanish (Subtitled) Language: French (Subtitled)

A horror for people who don't like horror
Review date: 2008-12-08 Rating: 4 out of 10

This film is an incredibly tame and pedestrian affair, another one I vaguely remember at the time of its release (though didn't see it) and have been subsequently sucked in to purchasing it on the strength of lots of glowing reviews on here. As with 'The Haunting' if that is your cup of tea you will probably like this also.
I always approach any film with an open mind but had a bad feeling from the start with an extremely contrived opening two minutes whereby G C Scott and his family having just broken down in the snow, in an absurdly out of place cheerful and jolly manner all merrily push the car to the side, laughing all the while in a bizarre directorial attempt to show us what a wonderful, loving family unit mother, father and daughter are before mother and daughter are wiped out 30 seconds later by the sudden appearance of two other vehicles on this remote stretch conspiring to crash into them both, although where exactly they disappeared to in the long shot showing the tragedy is anyones guess.
The date given for this event is 27 Nov though the next time you see George, 4 March, he states to his friend that he should be moving on as the accident was more than four months ago! Er no it was only just over 3 months ago George, I find it a bit bizarre that you don't know.
Some may argue that these are unimportant but it demonstrated to me far bigger problems with the script and cavalier directing. The whole premise was daft anyway, the 'changeling' in question who was now an old man was a six year old orphan when he was supplanted for the murdered heir to the estate in question yet he was portrayed as the villain of the film.
There was nothing scary in this, nothing. That is ok in itself, I watch a horror like any other film to be entertained first and foremost. This film is not entertaining. George C Scott is abysmal. Everything that occurs in the house is met with an understated and non-plussed response. Ok the events are tame but loud bangs, visions and balls bouncing down stairs would cause some types of reaction from most people instead of every event responded to as if you've forgotten where you'd put your newspaper.
No ghosts are ever seen though a wheelchair does go berserk at one point and chase a woman and like I said before a ball bounces down the stairs.
I try not to make a point of criticising other reviewers as tastes are different and everyone has their own opinion but come on, five stars for this? I am only not giving this 1 star as there are films much worse than this one that I have given 1 star to. The only thing I liked was the woman doing the automatic writing during the seance, composed and calm demeanour but with her hand going ten to the dozen scrawling away. I also quite liked the scene where George was at the 'psychic unit' You could tell it was the psychic unit a)from the discussion he was having with the guy in the white coat and b)because they were stood in a corridor under an arch with 'psychic unit' randomly stuck on it. The camera shot was deliberately high for this whole scene so you could see it at all times and it had the appearance of letters printed on individual sheets of A4 before being blu-tacked to the wall.
It all had the feel of a special spooky halloween edition of 'Murder She Wrote' designed for a wet wednesday afternoon viewing.
As I have said on other reviews I like all sorts of horrors, old and new. This has an old fashioned feel to it but remains utterly charmless at the same time. 1 and a half out of 5 and that is generous.