Main cast: Daniel Radcliffe (Arthur Kipps), Ciarán Hinds (Sam Daily), Janet McTeer (Elizabeth Daily), Liz White (Jennet Humfrye), Roger Allam (Mr Bentley), Tim McMullan (Jerome), Sophie Stuckey (Stella Kipps), and Misha Handley (Joseph Kipps)
Director: James Watkins
The Woman in Black is an old-school Gothic horror film, oh so British, and perhaps shockingly in an age of bad CGI banshee women and lazy jump scares, it is devoid of both tedious elements. The ghostly woman in question is played by an actress, and if they had touched her up during post-production with some CGI, it doesn’t seem too obvious here. This is one film that relies on the audience’s empathy with the broken protagonist to reach the finish line more than conventional scares.
I know, I know. Harry Potter’s in the lead role, playing a character that is likely far older than his actual age. Here’s another shocking revelation: he’s actually very good here. Looking like the gorgeous woobie result of a cross-pollination between Robert Pattinson and Jake Gyllenhaal, his character Arthur Kipps exudes at least twenty beautiful shades of tortured sexiness and brooding angst that I almost can’t remember the name of Mr Radcliffe’s most famous character.
This movie is set in the early 1900s. Ever since the death of his wife Stella, Arthur is living in a depressed fog. His son Joseph even draws him as a stick figure with a frowning face. His depression is also getting in the way of his job as a solicitor. Hence, in this movie, it’s do or die time in order to keep his job – Arthur must travel to this lovely village Crythin Gifford, to get in order the papers of the late Alice Drablow, in anticipation of selling the woman’s big cavernous home called the Eel Marsh House. Unfortunately for the widower, he soon finds that the villagers of this place have a shared tragedy: many of their children died tragically. As he stays in Eel Marsh House, he discovers that the tragic history of this place may have something to do with the children in this place dying with regularity.
Yes, as one can tell from the title of this movie, there is the usual evil ghost that wants to land misery on everyone as her revenge on what the folks in this place did to her while she was alive. Unlike those cheap and lazy movies featuring similar evil creatures, the Woman in Black here doesn’t do that stupid “Surprise! Jump scare!” nonsense too often here. The jump scares here are earned, and the movie actually prefers to present the chills and frights in that good old fashioned way of building up scenes and mounting suspense before delivering the fatal stroke. It also dwells considerably on Arthur’s tortured psyche, making me care for him. Hence, another source of fright in this movie stems from me wanting to see nice things happen to this fellow, and feeling this growing dread that he likely won’t because this is one bloody horror film.
Therefore, there is a lot placed on Mr Radcliffe’s shoulders to make this movie – Arthur Kipp needs to be both a sympathetic and interesting protagonist, the magnet that brings and holds everything else about this movie to him. He manages to do a good job here, surprising me since most of his post-you-know-what roles tend to be gimmicky or hammy, imbuing his character with all kinds of nuanced depths. Unlike his most famous role which saw him giving a single blank look throughout every freaking movie in the series, here, he conveys various different emotions using his facial expressions. There is no need for the script to tell me what Arthur is feeling – I look at Mr Radcliffe, and I get it.
The only issue I have with this movie is how the whole thing occasionally lapses into various dramatic scenes that feel suspiciously like filler to pad up the running time. Still, that’s just a small matter. On the whole, The Woman in Black is an unexpectedly good film. I was expecting another film full of lazy jump scares and formulaic shlock, and instead I get something so much better. Lovely day, indeed.
