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Review #418 of 365
Movie Review of The Abandoned (2006) [R] 94 minutes
Title in Español: Abandonados, Los
WIP™ Scale: $8.25
Where Viewed: AMC Theatres Highlands Ranch 24, Highlands Ranch, CO
When 1st Seen: 7 March 2007
Time: 10:05 p.m.
Film's Official Website • Film's Trailer
DVD Release Date: unscheduled
Directed by: Nacho Cerdà (The Machinist: Breaking the Rules)
Written by: Nacho Cerdà (Ataúdes de luz), Karim Hussain (Ascension), and Richard Stanley (The Secret Glory)
Featured Cast (Where You Might Remember Him/Her From):
Anastasia Hille (New Year's Day) • Karel Roden (Running Scared [2006]) • Valentin Ganev (Dark Descent) • Carlos Reig (Romasanta)
Soundtrack: order the CD below
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
Billed as the fan favorite from November 2006 Afterdark Horror Fest, Nacho Cerdà's The Abandoned is actually a very frightening film. Beginning with the inheritance of a home the agent, Andrei Misharin (Valentin Ganev) claims was her childhood home, Marie (Anastasia Hille) travels by truck driven by Anatoliy (Carlos Reig) to an abandoned house on a lone island in the middle of darkly forested central Russia. They arrive, of course, in the dead of night. Anatoliy gets out of the truck to survey the area for her safety, but he never returns. After some soul-searching and a bit of desperation, Marie takes a flashlight to investigate herself. She finds the creepy home no inhabited by rodents and pests, and then suddenly some oddball apparitions appear. No sign of Anatoliy, she returns to the truck, and eventually, when it won't start due to a nearly dead battery, she flees on foot in search of sanctuary. Instead, she falls, hits her head, and wakes up in the house under the care of Nicolai (Karel Roden) who claims to be her long lost twin brother. He claims he believes they've been brought there for the same reason, basically, to relive the death of their mother and to die deaths they somehow escaped as children. She's obviously suspicious of the guy and his claims, but she has no one else to whom to turn, and both continue to see walking zombies who bear a striking resemblance to themselves only dead. The house wants them back.
"… very frightening …"
While the twisty premise is intriguing, it's not executed in the most coherent of ways leading to a confusing, though nonetheless frightening viewing. In spots, the film takes a turn into the area of being repetitive, with far too much of Marie running around the woods trying to find a way out. Obviously, there is no way out, and the sooner she accepts this and works to figure out what to do, the better. The ending is particularly twisty and thrilling, yet with the same caveats as mentioned before. Director, Nacho Cerdà has done a very good job of keeping the suspense up, even through a mildly convoluted story sequence. The acting is borderline atrocious, but no worse than what one usually expects when it comes to the genre. By the end, one must start to wonder how many more times Marie will see her doppelganger with glowing white fish eyes and think it's worth hanging around to see how all this ends up. Regardless, the film must be applauded for taking a different route than the nearly incessant, recent rash of malevolent ghost films from Japan. At least, some parts of The Abandoned seemed a bit new. This truly was a frightening idea. Had it been given the star treatment and some work on the script here and there, it could have been one of the best psychological thrillers of the year. Instead, it's a film that may keep one up a few nights in a row and avoiding mirrors where one might see the reflection of oneself with a zombie-like expression on one's face, but won't last much beyond that.
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Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Other Projects Featuring The Abandoned (2006)
Cast Members
Anastasia Hille
• Karel Roden • Valentin GanevCarlos Reig
Co-writer / Director
Nacho Cerdà
Writer
Karim Hussain
• Richard Stanley | DVD | VHS | |
The Abandoned (2006) Review-lite [150-word cap]
Billed as the fan favorite from November 2006 Afterdark Horror Fest, Nacho Cerdà's The Abandoned is actually a very frightening film. Beginning with the inheritance of a home the agent, Andrei Misharin (Valentin Ganev) claims was her childhood home, Marie (Anastasia Hille) travels by truck driven by Anatoliy (Carlos Reig) to an abandoned house on a lone island in the middle of darkly forested central Russia. They arrive, of course, in the dead of night. While the twisty premise is intriguing, it's not executed in the most coherent of ways leading to a confusing, though nonetheless frightening viewing. Cerdà has done a very good job of keeping the suspense up, even through a mildly convoluted story sequence. The acting is borderline atrocious, but no worse than what one usually expects when it comes to the genre. It's a film that may keep one up a few nights in a row, but it won't last much beyond that.
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