The Night House Review: Sundance 2020 – /FILM

Jump scares get a bad rap, primarily because filmmakers use them in cheap ways. The worst kind of jump scare the kind that deserves scorn are of the fake-out variety. As in: someone opens a closet door and a cat jumps out, or a completely harmless person suddenly pops into frame and the soundtrack blares for a second. These types of jump scares can hit the bricks. But thereare good jump scares. These are the ones designed to startle and shake you with genuinely scary moments, not faux distractions. David BrucknersThe Night Houseis full of several of these genuine jump scares and boy oh boy are they effective.

Rebecca Hall is the lead ofThe Night House, and thank heavens for that. Hall is one of the best actresses working right now, and shes able to make some of the sillier elements ofBen Collins and Luke Piotrowskis cluttered script seemmostly plausible. Hall plays Beth, a teacher who has recently lost her husband Owen (Evan Jonigkeit), a successful architect. Even though their marriage seemed perfectly happy, and the often depressed Beth always thought of Owen as her rock, her spouse died by suicide, and the experience has left Beth understandably unmoored.

Beth spends most nights drunkenly stumbling around the beautiful lake house Owen built for them, unable to reconcile why her husband would shoot himself. Her grief becomes compounded by a sudden belief that shes not alone in the house. Beth is a skeptic in life after death she was once in a car crash that left her technically dead for four minutes before being revived, and the experience has left her certain that theres nothing awaiting us on the other side. But creepy stuff keeps happening: the radio randomly turns on at full volume, playing Beth and Owens wedding song; loud knocking sounds are heard; and Beth keeps having disturbing dreams, only to find herself waking up on the floor in random rooms in the house.Springing into action, Beth starts digging into Owens life, trying to find answers. But the more she digs, the more she realizes she might not have really known her husband at all.

The Night House wants to do a lot of things. It wants to be a compelling mystery-thriller; it wants to be a portrait of crushing, even existential grief; and it wants to scare the shit out of you. Itsmostly successful on all those fronts, primarily thanks to Halls performance and Bruckners direction. Hall perfectly nails the grieving elements of her character shes an emotional wreck, prone to sudden fits of furious anger and crushing sadness. Hall isnt afraid to make Beth cold, even cruel at times. Its a risky move, and in a lesser performers hands, it couldve backfired. But Hall is such a confident, brave, risk-taking actor that its easy to go all-in with her.

Bruckner, who helmedThe Ritual, as well as one of the best segments ofVHS (Amateur Night), is adept at building dread. He lets the camera linger longer than it should, creating a palpable sense of unease. And he knows how to stage one hell of a jump scare. Make that jumpscares theres one sequence midway through the film where the filmmaker packs on one genuinely scary jump scare after another, after another, after another. The construction of the scene is remarkable just when you think things are going to let-upanother jarring event occurs.

As effective as these moments are, they also tend to border on being manipulative. The score fromBen Lovett is overblown to the extreme, leaning into the type of music that feels like its spoon-feeding us. It almost suggests a lack of confidence in the material, which is a shame, becauseThe Night Housewould work just as well with a far more subtle soundtrack.

Beths investigation into her potential haunting is all building towards a conclusion that doesnt quite add up. This is the type of story that starts to fall apart the more you think about it, and the entire third act feels as ifThe Night House is breaking all the rules it set-up because it couldnt think of anything better to do. This is unfortunate, but not a deal-breaking. The horror on display here is so powerful, and Halls work is so strong, that youre bound to come away fromThe Night House properly haunted.

/Film Rating: 7 out of 10

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The Night House Review: Sundance 2020 - /FILM

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero