Most of the reviews including those from IMDb members will emphasize how you don't see these sort of films anymore, they hark back to the Vincent Price or Hammer Films of the 60s.
That's true, but the REAL STORY is that WHAT YOU REALLY DON'T SEE ANYMORE are films that polarize the audience as much as this one does.
Brad Anderson, who has a spotted career with moments of sheer brilliance, appears to have made the most dangerous error a director can make -- he fell in love with a story based on setting and mood (a Poe tale) simply because of the aforesaid setting and mood, and COMPLETELY FORGOT this was a film medium, where setting and mood are just not enough.
To be clear the setting and mood are brilliantly done but that is all this film offers. The story proceeds as slowly as a fly crawling up a drape, a great cast is wasted, and the trope where "the inmates are running the asylum" is so overdone it has become a cliché.
That's true, but the REAL STORY is that WHAT YOU REALLY DON'T SEE ANYMORE are films that polarize the audience as much as this one does.
Brad Anderson, who has a spotted career with moments of sheer brilliance, appears to have made the most dangerous error a director can make -- he fell in love with a story based on setting and mood (a Poe tale) simply because of the aforesaid setting and mood, and COMPLETELY FORGOT this was a film medium, where setting and mood are just not enough.
To be clear the setting and mood are brilliantly done but that is all this film offers. The story proceeds as slowly as a fly crawling up a drape, a great cast is wasted, and the trope where "the inmates are running the asylum" is so overdone it has become a cliché.