THE WOMAN IN BLACK: a good old fashioned frightener

It's not subtle but it is effective.
THE WOMAN IN BLACK is the most genuinely scary horror film I've seen since 'The Haunting.'
That black and white classic from 1963 set a very high bar, and while THE WOMAN IN BLACK doesn't quite clear it, it does come impressively close.

Back in the day horror films managed to scare the bejesus out of us without resort to buckets of blood and gore and scantily clad co-eds foolishly deciding to split up to explore the haunted mansion/hotel/motel. THE WOMAN IN BLACK unashamedly follows in that older tradition, using manipulative devices that might uncharitably be described as cliches were they still actually being overused by the horror movie genre.
But they're not.
And, as a result, there's something refreshing in finding these tried and tested tricks still had the power to send substantial shivers from one end of my body to the other. There's the ghostly face at the upstairs window of an empty and decaying country house, a black-clad figure glimpsed just momentarily in an overgrown graveyard, the chill-inducing sensation that there's something or someone behind you in a deserted house, the face/hand/small animal that looms out of nowhere accompanied by the sound of screaming violins, the openly hostile villagers muttering inexplicable threats to the bemused outsider, mysterious figures emerging from billowing banks of fog etc etc. You know what I'm talking about.
It's more than fitting that this most retro of horror movies has been released under the Hammer Films banner - the studio that did more than any other to turn these scare tactics into cliches. Director James Watkins has created a film that is faithful to that heritage without feeling simply like a tired retread of all that came before.

In his first post Harry Potter role Daniel Radcliffe plays Arthur Kipps, a young solicitor in 1920s England who's dispatched to a remote coastal village to clear up the affairs of a recently deceased client who owned the aforementioned crumbling country house, located on an island accessible only by a causeway at low tide. Kipps already has more than a passing acquaintanceship with early death having lost his wife in childbirth, but even he isn't prepared for the smell of death which permeates the village.
Radcliffe acquits himself well in a demanding role (he's in practically every scene) and he certainly knows how to react appropriately to the numerous scares thrown at him, although I thought he was just a little too young to be entirely convincing, There's great support from Ciaran Hinds as the local squire, the only man in the village with a car, and the only person willing to assist Kipps, and there's some suitably creepy performances from various dark eyed, gothic looking kids destined to become the next victims of the titular lady in the dark garb.
Beautifully shot and suitably atmospheric, THE WOMAN IN BLACK is a solid piece of satisfyingly scary entertainment. I recommend it.