The Woman in Black (2012)

When you go in a haunted house at, say, the fair, you make certain adjustments to you expectations for decorum. Going into an any normal house, you would consider it rude or silly for your hosts to keep a spring-loaded crone in the closet to launch at you and a bit sloppy not to sweep up the cobwebs. But in a haunted house, it's all part of the deal: you don't question the logic of it. That's a good thing for The Woman in Black because not a lot of it makes any sense. But it delivers some jumps (though diminishing jumps), and that's why you buy the ticket.

Danielle Radcliffe is Arthur Kipps, widowed 18th century solicitor.... though I'm sure he thinks of himself only as "widowed solicitor," because no one really thinks about their place in the centuries besides Newt Gingrich (who probably introduces himself as "turn of the century politician.") As I say, Kipps was widowed and none to happy about it. He has a kid and job which he grips tenuously (the job). He's assigned to go settle a country estate--a haunted one, it seems. Why does this film take place in Victorian England? My guess: so that the characters have an excuse to behave in a stilted, eccentric manner.... a way that just doesn't fly these days except for on the English countryside... and no place more than the 18th century English countryside.

While the villagers act stilted and strange (besides the lively Ciarán Hinds), our hero Kipps acts frail, but determined, and our ghost acts like a bit of a bitch. Besides dragging a black dress around, she enjoys popping up at the corner of the screen whenever the music swells and turning ominously toward the camera. The problem is she doesn't do much else besides acting creepy, and even then, for our benefit. She never quite establishes any serious menace towards the man in the room... unless you're the type that can't stand it when the music suddenly swells... which I am.