I wanted to like this film, and I generally do enjoy a thoughtful ghost story, but this film makes it clear early on that it's not "The Uninvited." Heck, it's not even a Casper the Friendly Ghost episode! So little happens that you find yourself wanting to pick up a book to read as we have yet another LONG sequence of someone walking through the house-- they are endless and pointless. E,g,. James Mason is going from the drawing room to the kitchen to ask the maid a simple question and we see each room, each doorway, each ponderous step the entire distance. It is not suspense, it is padding pure and simple. Indeed a very large portion of this movie is padding to the point that you begin to wonder if you're watching a movie at all or an extremely dull reality show from 1906.
It didn't bother me so much that nothing was explained or that we never see the "ghost," what I found very annoying was oft repeated scenes. Mason talks to the real estate agent-- never to any satisfying conclusion-- again and again and again. There is NO development. The "elderly" couple speaks of how our ingenue is like a daughter to them over and over until you just want to scream. Lockwood seems to have two acting techniques-- smiling vapidly or softly moaning with her eyes shut and mumbling phrases over and over and over. (Am I repeating myself?)
In some ways, the cast did a banner job with the poor script and it is, I admit, amusing to see Mason and Mullen playing characters thirty or more years older than themselves (but even this falls flat as you can see that is exactly what they are doing.) Some fun character actors, the best being O,B, Clarence as the local gossip are sprinkled into the film, but all this is for naught as the plot simply goes no where and makes no sense-- keeping the dying woman in the house that is killing her and repeatedly talking about tearing the house down "brick by brick," words you hear again and again.
This film is a total time sink. Watching clothes dry on the line is more fun and interesting especially as there IS development there-- the clothes dry.
It didn't bother me so much that nothing was explained or that we never see the "ghost," what I found very annoying was oft repeated scenes. Mason talks to the real estate agent-- never to any satisfying conclusion-- again and again and again. There is NO development. The "elderly" couple speaks of how our ingenue is like a daughter to them over and over until you just want to scream. Lockwood seems to have two acting techniques-- smiling vapidly or softly moaning with her eyes shut and mumbling phrases over and over and over. (Am I repeating myself?)
In some ways, the cast did a banner job with the poor script and it is, I admit, amusing to see Mason and Mullen playing characters thirty or more years older than themselves (but even this falls flat as you can see that is exactly what they are doing.) Some fun character actors, the best being O,B, Clarence as the local gossip are sprinkled into the film, but all this is for naught as the plot simply goes no where and makes no sense-- keeping the dying woman in the house that is killing her and repeatedly talking about tearing the house down "brick by brick," words you hear again and again.
This film is a total time sink. Watching clothes dry on the line is more fun and interesting especially as there IS development there-- the clothes dry.