Writer: Christopher A Micklos (Screenplay)
Starring: Emmanline Friederichs, Madeline Conway, Carly Rae James Sauer, Davie Sapiro, Claudio Parrone Jr
Plot: When Ranae agrees to babysit for a family with a tragic past, a run-of-the-mill Saturday night quickly turns into a confrontation with unspeakable horror.
Tagline – Death isn’t always final
Runtime: 1 Hour 25 Minutes
There may be spoilers the rest of the review
Verdict: Tense Horror
Story: The Nursery starts when Ranae (Conway) gets given a babysitting job with the first night being a Saturday night, it isn’t long before Ranae starts seeing things around the house, her friends Calista (Friederichs), Grace (Sauer) and Jeremy (Parrone Jr) join her. Only for them to see a ghostly figure too.
As the night unfolds they look to confront the spirit and learn why it is haunting the house, only to find themselves facing a violent spirit they can’t control.
Thoughts on The Nursery
Characters – Ranae is the babysitter who does have her own tragic past to deal with, even though she does seem to overcome them, this night will test her new life and force her to face her past to battle the spirit haunting the house. Calista or Callie as the friends call her is the best friend of Ranae, who visits her at the home to offer support through the nights events. Grace is another one of the friends that visits, she brings her boyfriend which easily makes her the ‘slutty’ friend.
Performances – The performances are good in the film, with Madeline Conway taking the leading role and having to go through the largest amount on her character. The supporting cast fill the friends role well for the support.
Story – The story follows the babysitter that must learn the truth about the house to protect the baby from a violent spirit, joined by her friends, how can she survive the night. That is the core to the story, we have a good and bad points in this film’s story, first the idea of discussion about what type of spirit is an interest spin and easily one of my favorite parts of the film because we don’t just have the same scares happening. The idea that Ranae has a haunted past does help question her character, but this works to start with before undoing the hard work too early. The story can easily be compared to a Grudge type of story with the haunted house with a spirit that’s motivations are not as clear as they could be to our victims. Overall the story works for horror, does the basics well and doesn’t get much wrong.
Horror – The horror does work for the film, we have well built up moments of horror that give pay offs well through the film.
Settings – The whole film takes place in the singular location of the house, this does keep the horror confined, but I did find it confusing to just how big this house was.
Special Effects – The effects which are practical for the most part work very well, they are some clever camera ideas to create extra moments of scares.
Scene of the Movie – The Skype call discussion, because it tackles the actual research about the truth, which is different to most horror movies.
That Moment That Annoyed Me – The house doesn’t seem big enough to not hear screaming.
Final Thoughts – This is a good horror, it hits the scare marks well, follows the story and does keep us guessing to where everything will end up going.
Overall: Horror fans check it out.
Rating