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THE LITTLE STRANGER, 2018. Mild ghost story

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  • THE LITTLE STRANGER, 2018. Mild ghost story

    Lenny Abrahamson's glum follow-up to the Oscar-winning ROOM (Brie Larson), is another story largely told within the confines of a single location. But, here, it's a huge rural English mansion that has fallen into disrepair in the 1940s. Like their home, the family of three that still resides there has also seen much better times. Called to attend to the family's maid Betty (Liv Hill) is a country doctor Faraday (Domhnall Gleeson). There he meets the matriarch Mrs. Ayers (Charlotte Rampling) and her daughter Caroline (Ruth Wilson) and son Roderick (Will Poulter). By happenstance, Faraday had visited the mansion as a child during a party during the Ayers Estate's heyday (seen in flashbacks) and fixated on their youngest daughter Susan (Tipper Seifert-Cleveland) - who died tragically, shortly thereafter.

    In keeping with the tradition of period ghost stories, THE LITTLE STRANGER unfolds slowly. The details unveiled parsimoniously. There is a fine sense of period details, and the cast acquits themselves well, particularly Poulter in what could have been a clichéd role as the bitter son. The decaying mansion is a character upon itself (in one nice detail, we see Caroline literally try and patch a bit of fraying wall decoration in preparation for a small party). The tale contains some kernels about memory, loss and class, but none of them are ever truly compelling. It's less a horror film, than a gothic melodrama.

    As noted, the genre is marked by its deliberate manner of story-telling. Unfortunately, Director Abrahamson mistakes glacial pacing for a sense of impending dread. Here, it deadens the suspense instead of accentuating it (there were a handful of walkouts; bored, no doubt). The music and photography are similarly tame. Even though the ending (based upon a novel by Sarah Waters; screenplay by Lucinda Coxon) leaves open some intriguing questions, one is still left feeling let down by the endeavor, rather than encouraged to delve deeper into its mysteries.
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