Mike Flanagan's Direction

I was a fan of Oculus and Hush, and found that even though there were certainly flaws to each film, the one thing that was strikingly good about them was the direction. In other hands both films could have fallen flat and whimpered into nothingness but I think with relatively paper-thin plots Flanagan showed himself to be an astute and accomplished director of decent quality horror fare.

However...in contrast to that I think this film was actually let down by the direction and the way the action was conveyed onscreen. Most of the atmospheric/scare moments until the final act were so dark and showed so little that it was tough to feel any sense of impending danger except from the fact that the music was telling you to feel that way. Sometimes less is more, but scenes weren't even open to interpretation...they were just, well, quite uneventful and dull.

The final 20 minutes of the film really opened it out into a much more meaningful and worthwhile watch, and kudos to him and the film-makers for that, but I really struggled to feel the sense of dread and horror before that to allow the twist to really strike a chord. The preceding hour made the final act lose its resonance, which was unfortunate.

I'll continue to watch his work as he's already proven himself to be capable of really solid horror, but this felt like a bit of a misstep due to his execution and direction.