Frequently relying on horror tropes and cliches, Red’s first foray into horror reflects his inexperience and lack of imagination with the genre.
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Widely touted as wunderkind director Mikhael Red’s first studio film, ‘Eerie’ is a horror film set in a conservative, all-girls, Catholic high school convent. Popular Filipino TV actress Bea Alonzo stars in the lead role as Ms. Pat, who works at the school as a guidance counselor.
Every night, Pat stays back late at her desk, waiting to counsel the troubled ghost of Eri (Gillian Vicencio), a student who committed suicide in the school more than a decade ago. Pat’s empathetic method of relating with her students finds disagreement with Sor Alice, the convent’s strict Mother Superior, played by acclaimed actress Charo Santos. One day, a student is found murdered and police officer Julian (Jake Cuenca) enlists the help of Pat to investigate the murder.
The film takes place almost entirely on an old convent, with its Gothic architecture, long corridors, crumbling dilapidated toilet, all well designed to give off a naturally unsettling vibe. But despite the locations, the film struggles to scare. Red uses music too prescriptively and too early such that audiences already knows what to expect, killing off anticipation and tension. There is one good set piece, involving the Pat constantly having to relight matches to be able to see in the dark - with the audience constantly bracing themselves for a ghost to appear - but the sequences feel like it’s already been done many times in other horror movies. In fact, the feeling that we have already tread this territory before pervades the film.
Santos is a great actress but in this film, her archetypal role lacks nuance and her performance in this film is virtually one-note. The saving grace is that Alonzo gives a decent performance and keeps the audience interested in her character, even if the audience has lost interest in the film.
Frequently relying on horror tropes and cliches, Red’s first foray into horror reflects his inexperience and lack of imagination with the genre.
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