Deadline

*1/2 – Stranded in a creaky old mansion in Louisiana, a young screenwriter who is a part-time lunatic finds herself hallucinating that she is communing with a woman who was drowned in the very same house a few years prior in this 2009 psychological thriller. Unfortunately, aside from some fairly nice scenery and production values, this clunker has no real redeeming qualities. The most disappointing thing is that the underlying premise – although far from original – is fairly intriguing. It revolves around the above-mentioned young woman and her discovery of some video tapes in the mansion’s attic that seem to document a rather suffocating relationship and grisly murder. If the writers had built upon that instead of turning it into a hackneyed ‘hey-it-turns-out-everything-is-a-hallucination’ type of gyp job they may have been able to salvage some entertainment value. Instead, the 85 minute flick devotes a good half of its run time to showing Brittany Murphy wander around the house peeking behind doors and looking in boxes to the strains of eerie strings and whooshing background noises. It seems to be rather intent upon creating a tense and spooky atmosphere but is really only successful in putting the audience through a boring ordeal. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense either, as it went off on some goofy tangents and tried way too hard to be edgy and dramatic. I guess I’ve seen worse, but I can’t in good conscience recommend this to even the most loyal and indiscriminate of supernatural thriller or horror fans.