The Uninvited

The Uninvited is like me hitting on women at a bar. The material and execution are weak, but it is trying very hard. Sadly, this is not kindergarten. No one hands out high grades for effort. Results matter.

Emily Browning stars as Anna – a teen girl just released from a psychiatric facility after spending several months there following the horrible accidental death of her invalid mother. Upon returning home, Anna is not very happy to find out Dad (David Strathairn) has a new girlfriend, the mother’s former nurse, Rachael (Elizabeth Banks). Of course, the two don’t get along, but Anna is starting to believe the new lady love is the one responsible for her mother’s death.

Is Anna right?

Is she mentally disturbed?

Are ghosts helping her solve the case?

The Uninvited might provide a few cheap shocks, but you can get that by rubbing your feet on the rug and touching the electrical outlet, which won’t cost $10 (we must be cost conscious during these difficult economic times). Directors Charles and Thomas Guard try to milk every bit of suspense from this barren teat by pumping up the volume on the ominous music, wringing out every suspenseful moment until each drop has been sprinkled on the audience, and attempting to insert every plot twist you have seen in every horror movie before.

Worst of all, the Guard Brothers make The Uninvited into a movie without any depth or complexity. The audience is taken from moment to moment without much development or detail. Plot twists just kind of happen instead of building to some great revelation.

Ultimately, The Uninvited fails miserably because of the ending. It’s not fair. The audience has invested an hour and a half in the movie to be given a surprise ending that is a surprise because nothing within the movie has helped the audience play along and wonder if this might be how it all comes together.

Banks does her best to be creepy and scary, but, like with the rest of the cast, the ridiculous dialogue and situations nullify any positive reaction they could have elicited from the audience.

The Uninvited is rated PG-13 for violent and disturbing images, thematic material, sexual content, language and teen drinking.