Written and directed by Patrick Rea (Enclosure, Nailbiter), They Wait in the Dark is a horror film with a difference to the norm, mainly that it intelligently blends two different genres of horror, with both a supernatural threat and a physical threat for the two protagonists to be up against. It kept me guessing where this would head throughout, and I have to admit I can't say I saw its eventual route coming, with a third act that had some genuinely unexpected revelations for me, despite the hints threaded throughout.
I actually have a code for an iTunes giveaway of the movie, details on how to win this can be seen at the end of my review!
Amy (Sarah McGuire - The Stylist) and her young adopted son, Adrian (Patrick McGee) are on the run on the back roads of America. A chance encounter with a childhood friend, waitress Jenny (Paige Maria), leads to Amy revealing why the pair are so scared. It turns out that Amy adopted Adrian alongside her former girlfriend, Judith (Laurie Catherine Winkel - Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope video game voice work). Judith had a bit of a psychotic streak and during an argument stabbed Amy with a knife. The pair have traveled to a remote house that once belonged to Amy's parents, hoping they will be safe there due to Judith not knowing its location. The woman however, is hot on their heels, determined to claim Adrian for herself. That isn't the only issue the two face, as it turns out the home might contain an angry spirit, which might be related to her father's murder of her mother when she was a young girl.
This began really strangely, and I don't know if it is down to me not understanding the culture of America more. The film begins with Amy and Judith sleeping on the shop floor at the back of a petrol station as if it was the most normal thing in the world, something became even more odd by a motel being nearby, that Amy did have the money to afford a room. Thankfully after this weirdness the film settles down into something that felt more logical. With a split between the supernatural and the physical, I didn't know which of these would become the dominant focus, for the longest time it felt like the whole Judith plot was a red herring. She is shown getting ever closer to the pair, and she is shown to have a crazy streak, such as when she stabs a redneck purely because he was cat calling her, but the threat of the evil spirit at the house is what is occupying the protagonists. In a neat way, the spirit is virtually invisible for much of the movie, it's indicated Adrian can see the spirit, but for Amy it is an unseen force that has the ability to attack her seemingly at will. I loved the random nature the spirit came into being. Jenny mentions that teens had used the abandoned house as a party place over the years, and some of what they had done was try out black magic in the basement, it is indicated that Amy accidentally disturbing the left over chalk markings may have caused the spirit to manifest. The spirit is slowly revealed to the viewer little by little over the course of the whole film, I thought the makeup effects for this creature looked pretty decent. Mainly the special effects were of a good quality, and the blood and wounds looked good also. My biggest complaint came towards the end of the movie, when a character who was definitely dead could be seen blinking very blatantly not once, but twice in the background, I wish either CG had been used to cover up the blinking, or that the scene had been re-shot, as it was very distracting, getting in the way of an otherwise potentially powerful scene.
The protagonists I found to mainly be interesting, if not likable. Adrian was a character I was constantly going hot and cold on, sometimes McGee delivered his lines perfectly, but then there would be occasions when his character appeared to changed emotive states halfway through a scene, making him seem a bit artificial. He is a child, so its a bit unfair to be too harsh on him. Amy was a weirdo, but this is slowly explained due to constant flashbacks showing her mother's cruel treatment of her as a child, which explains the nasty streak that kept surprising me by bursting out of her. As the movie ran on, it started to seem more and more that she is not as entirely innocent as she first appeared she might be. I have known people in real life who had an abusive parent, and then in turn became abusers themselves, so this aspect of her character did feel realistic to me. The only other key characters were Jenny (a bit of a blank slate), and Judith, someone who seemed evil for evil's sake, she felt like a threat, though there wasn't really any reason given for why she was the way she was.
I thought They Wait in the Dark had some great ideas to it, it isn't often that I am taken by surprise by the way a story changes. In hindsight it might have been more obvious than I thought, but it was lovely to have expectations tipped on their head so late into a film. They Wait in the Dark was released in the UK on November 13th.
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