The Haunting of Hill House on Netflix (Spoilers)

it’s still worth it imo

Yep.

(unless you're one of those "an iffy ending undoes any good that came before" types, which, idk how ppl like that ever enjoy horror)

lol otm

lol IF this had been horror. Instead, it felt like a sum total of 20 minutes of spooky stuff sprinkled throughout a bunch of endless sibling bickering

mr veg called it “the screaming & crying show”

As I said on the main TV thread, it's absolutely a melodrama with horror elements rather than the other way around. I will say a LOT of people (on social media etc.) do seem to find it v spooky, but movies stopped scaring me a long time ago so I'm not a great barometer for these things

it made me jump quite a few times & i found it mildly scary in places. no more or less scary than the Conjuring imo

To talk about stuff besides the ending: I feel like a big part of the Netflix model is making sure that there's a centerpiece sequence people talk about - Daredevil with its long-take fight scenes, for instance. But the end of "Bent-Neck Lady" and the long takes in "Two Storms" were genuinely impressive and even emotive in a way Netflix shit almost never is.

just starting episode 2 and jesus stop trying to force the kid to see his dead grandma!

The family seems to have a deep commitment to the idea that people should see the dead bodies of their loved ones...

If I had a family member that was an embalmer, I would explicitly make it clear than I would not want them performing that task on me.

It's odd because it's kind of treated like it's some universal part of grief. Ah well, WASPs gonna WASP, I guess.

i have never been to an open casket funeral - really dont want to ever have to go to one imo

No, me either.

so the Dudleys' second kid, Abigail, she WAS real, right? I can't quite wrap my head around the fact that Luke kept saying he had an imaginary friend who was a little girl and nobody put two and two together that it was the Dudleys' kid. I guess maybe the Crains didn't know the Dudleys even had a kid until the scene when Mrs. Dudley talked to Mrs. Crain about it, but considering Mrs. Dudley was always around during the day and Luke was always yapping about this imaginary friend, you think at least she would have put it together.

fwiw I liked the ending, even if it was indeed rather touchy-feely "Lost"-esque. so much horror nowadays resolves with EVERYONE dying brutally and meaninglessly that I was expecting the show to go that route.

I don't think Luke ever called her imaginary, it was just their assumption. I have to say that was a nice little twist (brutal to watch a kid merrily gulp poison, though)

yeah, I was imprecise there, what I meant was that everyone assumed she was imaginary.

Yep, they were all aware that there was a young girl that actually lived on the property and they never thought for a second Luke's friend might be real

It was both dumb and an incredibly obvious twist

another thing that irked me was Shirley's one-night stand, the way it was just sort of tossed in at the 11th hour as a way to explain her being an asshole and more importantly to give her a reason to need redemption.

yeah, that dude literally materialised out of nowhere

yeah i think it could have been integrated better

I'm not going to read this whole thread since I'm only three episodes in but I think the casting in this is superb. They did an amazing job of not only finding people who actually look related to each other (at least the women) but also casting younger people who really do look like the older actors.

It seems to not be a universal opinion (to say the least), but I thought the casting and acting was excellent.

i agree except for stupid dumb Steve

I think some of the kid acting was a little kid acting-y but that's more than forgivable; all the non-Huisman adults are great. it's kind of funny to see his previous leading ladies (Reaser, Gugino, Siegel) united as one unhappy family.

agree!

Siegel is so good. I need to see Hush and Ouija 2 now. Huge fan.

the amazing one take (if it really was) during Eulogy when she misses the arm of the couch and falls on her ass!

Her screams when she touches Nelly's body ... i rarely find anything in a horror film heartbreaking but that was.

of the Flanagan flicks I've seen, I'd rank 'em:

Absentia
Oculus
Ouija 2
Gerald's Game
Hush

Oculus was pretty decent imo. I havent seen any of the others

Oculus was great.

Way, way better than a movie about a ~spooky mirror~ has any right to be.

otm

karen gillan also. which is the only reason I watched it at first

Man I really hated oculus and would put it dead last of the Flanagans I’ve seen

Man, that ranking is so not my ranking. Hush is his best movie imo

Madness. It's fine but no better than a half dozen other home invasion flicks.

I'd say the premise and execution is a little better than that

but I guess I think all his other movies have major elements that don't work for me, and Hush just does exactly what it sets out to with maximum efficiency

Finished this last night. Last episode was a little cheesy but at least it wasn't a complete letdown the way the end of Castle Rock was. The implication at the end though that the House itself isn't evil.. I guess this is consistent? I'm trying to think back on everything that happened in the house and is it true that nothing inside the house itself ever actually hurt anyone? Aside from mom going insane...but... how much of that was delusion on her part and something that the house created?

I thought the conversation between her and the dad around how he inflicted harm on the children by taking them and then shielding them from the truth was quite moving. but again I was fucking stoned.

Kate Siegel's speech about feeling absolutely nothing was quite great also, because that could be supernatural, but it could just be an accurate depiction of how grief can settle in.

Anyway I appreciated this show. It was intelligent, legitimately spooky and disturbing without ever being gory, and the performances were all pretty great. Of course there won't be a second season. Wouldn't mind seeing them helm another series though but i see he's doing Doctor Sleep (there are several shots in this that looked to me like "this is my Shining Sequel audition shot")

all the wee secret ghosts were creeeeepy

they were! i cant remember which ep it was but when little steve opted to hide ~under~ the bed from the tall man ghost i was like in any other house maybe but there’s prob something under there too!!
turned out there wasnt but it wigged me nonetheless
(then again i still have residual under the bed fears from childhood lol)

So I just finished this and really enjoyed it, until the last 15-20 mins of the last ep at which point I was basically:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Va5_rn3vG3A/hqdefault.jpg

But I loved the creepiness of the ghosts, especially tall man (was that meant to be ol'man Hill?) with his stick and hat.

And did anything ever explain the clock repairman? Were we just meant to assume the house is populated with old ghosts who like being there? The ending jarred with the rest for me, it made little sense that this was their "home" when the last 95% of the show had depicted the place as insane and distressing and evil.

yeah totally

This was total shit.

Just finished last night. I want to start with this:

another thing that irked me was Shirley's one-night stand, the way it was just sort of tossed in at the 11th hour as a way to explain her being an asshole and more importantly to give her a reason to need redemption.

― evol j, Thursday, October 25, 2018 2:51 PM (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, that dude literally materialised out of nowhere

― Number None, Thursday, October 25, 2018 3:05 PM (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah i think it could have been integrated better

― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Thursday, October 25, 2018 3:09 PM (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

...and say y'all are bad at paying attention because Shirley's one night stand dude popped up intermittently through the entire series.

And it sounds like you're really gonna hate his next series, No Ghosts, Just Talking

The Talky Ghost, and the big twist is he's not actually a ghost.

OK, a compromise - maybe some ghosts sitting about discussing the 'Like A Virgin' video?

bly manor = perfectly splendid schmaltz. I liked hill house a lot more too, scarier and I thought the way they handled luke’s character was actually interesting

oh my god i do not care about the ghost shirley fucked

lmao as reported this blows

lol I completely forgot about that plot stand for good reason

i mean he wasn't even a ghost, he just haunted her or whatever, but god, so lame, i do not need her to have cheated on her husband to realize she has flaws, she's extremely sanctimonious, that's her character flaw, it's good enough

The end was fine, good even, in terms of story but they fucked up the tone and way overexplained what you were supposed to take from it

i ultimately agree with this old chap post bc i feel like you could salvage something worthwhile from the last hour if you cut... so much of the dialogue

one nice thing i'll say about the finale: abigail being real was a great choice

yes! that was a nifty surprise

I don’t know if this is true cause I haven’t seen enough of his works but Mike Flanagan seems Bad.At.Endings. Of five of his works I’ve seen, the only one that had an ending I legitimately liked was “Hush”.

I love Oculus' downer ending.

He should have brought in Frank Darabont as a consultant on Gerald's Game to fix that awful King ending, though, for sure.

I love Oculus' downer ending.

― it bangs for thee (Simon H.)

Didn't realise he did Oculus!

I haven’t seen Oculus - will check that out. It’s the one with Karen Gillan yes?

Gerald’s Game was so good until those last five minutes, makes me genuinely angry just thinking about it lol

yep that's the one! iirc she has a memorable entrance

I never saw Gerald's Game but I will say I am deeply indebted to the book because it taught me that I didn't need to finish reading something if I hate it

Absentia ending was alright

As we barrel toward the start of production on @intrepid's new @netflix series THE MIDNIGHT CLUB, based on the work of Christopher Pike, I'm honored and thrilled to announce our cast:

— Mike Flanagan (@flanaganfilm) February 1, 2021

Christopher Pike! 12-year-old me would've been stoked about this lol

oh and I finally saw Oculus. The climax is better than most Flanagan endings but I still wouldn't exactly call it good - somehow it was both heavily foreshadowed AND seemed to come out of nowhere

Oculus isn't perfect but it manages to be a good movie about an evil mirror, and that's enough for me

that is true - as always, saved by great character work and a strong emotional core

is this the thread where we can discuss Midnight Mass? I'm on the final two episodes now - so far it's got both Flanagan's best and absolute worst tendencies on display, but i'm still mostly into it.

it's less scary than the two Hauntings, but potentially more traumatising for anyone who had a strict religious upbringing

it is good though?

I like it! But I can see how it can test some viewers' patience - it's slow-going to start with and he does love those goddamn monologues/long conversations. They hit hard on some occasions and completely kill the show's momentum on others.

Excellent cast though - Hamish Linklater esp but almost everyone is on point, which helps to distract from some of the clumsier writing. pleasantly surprised by the accurate and thoughtful portrayal of Muslim characters in this too.

And it sounds like you're really gonna hate his next series, No Ghosts, Just Talking

― it bangs for thee (Simon H.), Monday, November 23, 2020 2:03 AM (ten months ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is not entirely inaccurate, lol