There are two kinds of horror films. The first depends for its scares on graphic gore, unrestrained violence, and blood -- lots of it. The second relies more on mood and an escalating sense of terror than gruesome images to get under the skin. "The Woman in Black" falls into the second category. It's a film rich in atmosphere that takes its time getting underway but, once it kicks in, never lets go.

In pre-World War I England, Arthur Kipps (Daniel Radcliffe), a young London lawyer with a small son, is grieving over his dead wife. His employer is fed up with Arthur's dour attitude and sends him to Yorkshire to handle the sale of an estate. Arthur is warned that this will be his last chance to distinguish himself for the firm.

Arriving after a long journey, Arthur is met and befriended by a local squire, Daily (Ciaran Hinds), though the other townsfolk are not thrilled with the visit of an outsider. Arthur is brought to the house of the deceased, which lies quite a distance from town. It is the textbook example of the House of Gloom -- grey, run down, surrounded by overgrown shrubbery, broken gates marking its entrance -- a place that immediately foreshadows bad things to come.

For much of the movie, Arthur is alone in the house -- or is he? Many of the trappings of a traditional ghost story are here -- the rainstorm, shadowy corridors, a dog barking at something not seen, an endless number of rooms, each with creepy and unsettling contents. And then there are the sightings: a darkly attired female figure, a face at a window, a fresh handprint on a window, a corpse rising from a muddy grave. Whether these are real or only figments of Arthur's imagination is left to speculation -- at least for a while.

"The Woman in Black" is from Hammer Studios, famous for a series of highly profitable Technicolor horror films made between 1957 and the early 70's. Those features always had great production values and good actors, giving them far more style than their competitors. "The Woman in Black" is true to that tradition. Instead of a collection of young and pretty 20-somethings who will be disposed of in messy ways, it boasts a first-rate cast.

Mr. Radcliffe's character is the focus of the movie and he is totally convincing as the lawyer hoping to make good while under a cloud of depression over the loss of his beloved wife. He infuses his performance with a sad determination, as if he is running a track meet with his feet encased in cement blocks. He forges on, knowing his livelihood depends on successfully delving through a myriad of papers, settling the estate, and seeing to the sale of the house. Yet he misses his wife and the life they had together. His Arthur Kipps is as far removed from Harry Potter as Hamlet is from the Nutty Professor.

Mr. Hinds's Squire Daily is on hand mostly to provide balance to the inhospitable townsfolk, who would be equally at home carrying torches up a hill in a Frankenstein movie. He prides himself on not being superstitious and refuses to believe the many deaths of children in town are anything more than unfortunate coincidence. He also provides some exposition, filling us in on what happened in that gloomy house and why Arthur will undoubtedly fail to find a local buyer. Hinds has a patrician look and never smiles. He suggests a careworn aristocrat who has seen much and prefers to trust his senses to belief in the otherworldly.

Janet McTeer appears briefly, but unforgettably, as Mrs. Daily, a woman who is either an amusing eccentric or a looney, depending on how you interpret her actions. Ms. McTeer adds bizarre contrast to a film in which the expression of choice appears to be glumness. Dressed in frills and smiling pleasantly, she enjoys hosting Arthur for dinner. It's not until we see some of her odd habits that we realize she may have a few cards missing from her deck.

Director James Watkins has fashioned an entertaining horror film. It's the kind of movie those who are turned off by bloody mayhem can embrace, since it's more about dread and terror than horror. We experience the house and its history through the eyes of Arthur Kipps. Watkins knows how to use sound and silence to enhance mood. Long stretches of silence will precede a loud noise that will make us jump, but those stretches of silence are filled with suspense and anticipation. We know that something -- anything -- might happen unexpectedly.

Ample credit must be given to those responsible for the film's creepy milieu. Art director Paul Ghirardani, production designer Kave Quinn, and set decorator Niamh Coulter have decorated every nook and cranny of the old manor house with Victorian furnishings, faded paintings, large carved cabinets, countless candles, cobwebs, and eerie old wind-up toys. One can almost smell the mustiness.

Rated PG-13, "The Woman in Black" takes itself seriously and never resorts to self-deprecation. The characters behave intelligently and have actual motivations. It is in the league of Jack Clayton's "The Innocents" or Robert Wise's creaky-old-house melodrama, "The Haunting." Like those earlier films, it shows what happens when a person is confronted with the supernatural and reality seems to spin wildly out of control. Read more ›

Forget Harry Potter when you watch The Woman in Black. One thing has nothing to do with the other. Daniel Radcliffe is struggling not to be typecast, to establish himself as an adult actor, not an easy accomplishment for any child star. Radcliffe does a creditable job in this movie. A classic, gothic horror story, it contains scary elements without resorting to the gory, shlocky slasher stuff of recent decades. As Arthur Kipps, the young lawyer devastated by his wife's childbed death, he has little to do other than to act wary and frightened, and appear foolhardy enough to go where no sane person ever would. This film has many strengths, among them the perfect dark, eerie sets, the cinematography that lends a sense of black and white to what is actually a color production, and enough of a mystery to make the viewer wonder what's going on in the forbidding town to which Arthur is sent to work. Along with him, we figure out, step by step, exactly what motivates the black veiled apparition, and along with him, we trust that he'll be able to put her to rest.

But there are weaknesses as well. It becomes a bit tiresome to follow Arthur through the dismal corridors of the haunted mansion, armed as he is with only a candle and an axe. Too much reliance is placed upon the sudden shocking revelation, which the audience learns to anticipate. The most effective scene takes place outside the estate, at a family crypt where Arthur encounters the distraught mother of a dead child. Most of the supporting actors have little to do other than to look forbidding and threatening, but Ciaran Hinds and Janet McTeer are superb in there roles as the grieving couple who, alone amongst their neighbors, offer some support to Arthur. The ending is a true shocker.

As is typical, the screenplay is substantially different from the novel upon which it is based, so watch the movie as a separate entity. It's worth a look. I needed a drink to settle down afterwards!

I love gothic horror -- big cobwebbed houses, squawking ravens, rolling mists and mysterious sinister figures that are only glimpsed. "The Woman in Black" has all of those. In fact, this slow, haunting movie loads on the Edwardian ghost-story atmosphere so thick that it practically chokes you -- and while it tends to move slowly, it's beautifully creepy.

Young lawyer Arthur Kipps (Daniel Radcliffe) has a life in tatters -- his career is in jeopardy, and he's still in mourning over the loss of his wife four years ago. He's sent to sort through the personal effects of Alice Drablow, who left behind a decayed mansion set in the misty marshes -- and when visiting the house, he sees a veiled woman in black.

The locals are also desperate to get rid of him, even blaming him for the death of a child who drank lye. And soon Kipps begins to understand why, as he unravels the secrets of the Drablow family, and the madwoman who lost her child long ago. With the help of his new friend Sam Daily (Ciarán Hinds), Kipps will set out to stop the Woman in Black before she claims what's dearest to him.

I haven't been too impressed with the output of the revitalized Hammer Films company. "The Woman in Black" is probably the best horror movie they've produced -- it feels like a modern version of their shadowy, gothic old movies. It's also not very scary, although director James Watkins tosses in a few jump scares (a raven, a faucet, etc).

Instead, the movie just makes you uneasy. We're constantly aware that SOMETHING is hovering over this town. But for most of the movie, we only see fleeting glimpses of the Woman and her power.

The biggest problem is that the movie moves rather slowly, especially in the first half. But for me, it's compensated for by Watkins inserting some truly unnerving scenes, like a hysterical Mrs. Daily carving into the table. And the gothic atmosphere is so heavy and dark that it practically drips from the screen -- vast mildewed houses, foggy marshes, half-forgotten letters and old photos, and a grey rainy light that seems to wash the colors from the world.

There's not a trace of Harry Potter in Daniel Radcliffe's performance here. His Arthur Kipps is a haunted, broken figure who seems strangely detached from the world around him, except when it comes to endangered children. The only problem is that Radcliffe looks a little young for the role -- whenever Arthur is with his little son, he looks more like the kid's big brother.

"The Woman in Black" is rather slow at times, but the gothic atmosphere and a strong performance from Radcliffe almost make up for that. Well, I'll gladly take it over rotten slasher remakes. Read more ›