I liked it

Just saw this today and didn't really expect much, but really enjoyed it. I know some don't like horror movies mixed with strong drama ... but I do, and was surprised by some of the psychological twists and turns in the drama interlacing with the horror story itself. The acting was very solid, and the script was really pretty good as far as I can see. From the comments, it looks like a lot of folks are perhaps understandably upset by some of the repetition from other horror flicks, and for sure, if your taste is lots of novelty, this probably isn't the movie for you. Me, I'm fine with repetition that has purpose and it looks to me like that's the kind that's in this movie. Something will happen, and I'll say to myself, "Sheesh isn't that kind of ... oh!" when it turns out to have a bit of a twist of some kind that redeems it really well. Bottom line, I think for anyone wondering whether to see this or not, if you like horror with plenty of human drama, this might be for you. It definitely was for me.

For those who have seen it or who haven't and don't mind some spoilers ... here's my take on the movie ... a lot of the memes that are reworked really bring out psychological horror in a very compelling way ... for example at first we're given to understand that this old family brutalized a child in the "disappointments room" ... which is true but ... but ... when we're shown the vision that Mom sees of what happened, there's the Judge (the Dad in the past) trying to justify murder to put his impaired daughter "out of her misery." Still horrible but suddenly there's this human element that grips my throat and I'm wondering what else there is to the story. Well what else there is to the story is today's story with Mom/Dana. Her unfolding story is horrible and grisly in its own way. When we see her in that vision murdering the Judge to save her son (paralleling both his daughter and hers) ... with the old man putting a pillow over her son's face to suffocate him ... she goes wild and we're all naturally thinking that's a mother's natural reaction to finding a horrible old man suffocating her son. But is there more to the suffocation pushing a button in her? We find that she had come close to murdering her own young son when in a trance of killing the old Judge ... but then the stories of the Judge and his daughter and of Mom and her daughter get linked in a really horrible way and we find out that suffocation is how Mom's daughter died. Specifically, her daughter was suffocated by Mom/Dana. Was it by accident? That's what we want to believe. But maybe not? Me I sure didn't see any of this coming, but of course it fits in perfectly. We have Dana's laid-back Dude trying to re-assure her that it was an accident. But ... was it? We don't know do we? That image of Mom on the bed with her young daughter looked at first so wonderfully motherly ... and then there's that crying by the baby and Mom's exasperated look on her face. Hey we all know that being a parent is hard, and there are times a crying baby is going to push everybody's buttons. But that look on Kate Beckinsale's face was just a glimpse but really eerily dangerous looking. Kate Beckingsale really gives us both the loving mother and the over-wrought, irritated mother very realistically and convincingly. But that's a scary sequence. Gets scarier when in the third picture we have her awake and finding the baby dead underneath her. Was it an accident? Or ... not? Is the real Disappointments Room that upper floor room of the old Judge and his wife's eery house? Or was it the room in which Mom's daughter was suffocated by her Mother? Lots of questions left hanging. Then the ending with Dana's family driving off ... and that picture of the old Judge looking after her ... and her still clutching a child's toy belonging to the old Judge's daughter ... left even more questions about linkage between the two horror stories.

My 2 bits or maybe just a little more ... :-) ...