I have a fondness, a weakness for sad, beautiful "horror" movies. It started with the gorgeous and exceedingly strange "Neither The Sand Nor The Sea," also known as "The Exorcism of Hugh."
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| sweethearts |
The film tells the story of an unhappy wife who runs away from her marriage and falls in love with a stranger, only to have him die suddenly... but death is not the end of their love (WHOA). The film isn't terribly scary, but it is atmospheric and haunting. I watched this several years ago, and I think about it often.
And then there is "The Orphanage," which did scare me quite a bit, even though I watched it in a bright, sunny room, last fall.
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| creepy, yes? |
It had its scares, and it had its mysteries, all set in a gorgeous old, huge house. But then the ending came at me out of nowhere, and I found myself sobbing openly. Such a good film. And, of course, they're remaking it, American-style.
Tonight I watched "The Eclipse," which is another astonishingly beautiful, sad "horror" film, a sort of ghost story. Ciaran Hinds plays a widower who suddenly starts experiencing very strange goings-on.
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| strange goings-on |
These odd occurrences start happening just as he meets a woman who writes about ghosts, played by Iben Hjejle.
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| more strange goings-on |
There are hauntings, and there are scares, but there are also strong human interactions, and it is these interactions that make the movie for me. Also, I adore Ciaran Hinds. And it is all filmed in a beautiful seaside Irish town.
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