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Director: Juan Antonio Bayona
Starring: Belen Rueda, Fernando Cayo, Roger Princep,
Pan’s Labyrinth producer Guillermo Del Torro is behind the scenes for this familiar subtitled suspense film about a spooky old mansion with secrets in its past. There are enough original ideas in the moody feature to keep things fresh and Juan Antonio Bayona adeptly handles the directorial helm, though he doesn’t manage to build up much tension and the dark Peter Pan story isn’t always easy to follow.
Belen Rueda is an orphan named Laura who is pulled from her friends to be adopted as a young girl. Years later, an adult Laura returns to the orphanage with her husband, Carlos (Fernando Cayo), and adopted son, Simon (Roger Princep) with the plan of turning the old building into a home for special needs children. All seems fine until young Simon begins to have involved relationships with imaginary friends and starts to act out, before vanishing. Time passes, but Laura and Carlos, along with authorities, are unable to find him, but find a deepening mystery about the house.
Not as impressive as Del Torro’s Oscar winning Pan’s Labyrinth from a couple years back, but this is still a well made film with another dark fairy tale theme, and a clever story that could have used a little more punch, but should still please smart horror fans.
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