Deadline

"Deadline" is a very creepy film in many ways. The late Brittany Murphy looks like death, at least partly on purpose as her character, Alice, is very sickly but this is no way to remember her. It was literally like watching a diseased ghost, and that realism was too much for me.

A writer in a remote house with psychological problems hears and sees strange disturbances but is it all in her head or is somebody, or something, trying to kill her? The story has been done many times before, and this wasn't a particularly good rendition of it. That's the main reason why the IMDb rating is so low. The filmmakers even seemed to get confused with the ending. They gave us a resolution but they hadn't quite worked out all the details.

The film itself though, was very well shot. They set-up a creepy atmosphere from the very beginning and never let up. Subtle camera work kept up the same suspense level throughout. This film was made on a low-budget and they made it well.

Recommending this is tricky. I was faithfully terrified - not so much because of the storyline but because of what I was watching. Brittany Murphy was so pallid and anemic, it was scary. And the atmosphere and slow moving camera shots were done so efficiently well, significantly better than most horror-thrillers that I have seen. If you want to be scared from a well-told story, you won't find that here. If you want to be scared from the realism, then you just might want to take a look. If I knew what I was getting myself into, I wouldn't have watched it. And yet, at the same time, I'm glad that I did - I like seeing low-budget independent films made well.

I'm certain that somewhere in Los Angeles there's a machine that is able to combine random genre clichés and churn out screenplays and storyboards for studios. For a few extra bucks, it will even make casting suggestions. 'Deadline' is a result.

Spending a few nights alone in an abandoned Victorian mansion must be high on most people's list of things not to do. Not so Alice, who jumps at the chance to shut herself away in the spooky old house in order to finish a long-overdue manuscript. Even doors opening on their own, screams in the night, and an abusive boyfriend fresh out of prison can't convince her to seek someplace a little closer to civilization. Hell, she can't even turn a light on when walking around at night. Taking such an implausible scenario as its starting point doesn't bode well, and it can only go downhill from there. Possessing all the scares of an episode of 'The Ghost Whisperer', the complete lack of creativity or originality is depressing.

Brittany Murphy plays an emotionally broken young woman looking for solitude to try to meet a deadline for a manuscript. The movie itself is haunting since Murphy actually does die about a year later under suspicious circumstance after wasting away from some trauma. Her death in real life is deemed natural, but skeptics think there's more to it and her husband does about 6 months later from virtually identical "health issues.". It's almost prescient. Her character is offered a beautiful but secluded house to stay in while she finishes her manuscript. This "friend" is not doing Her any favors as the house is haunted, or cursed. Age finds some home movie cassettes and becomes obsessed with them. The home movie footage documents of the prior couple's disintegrating relationship. Fortunately she plays the dozen or unmarked video cassettes in chronological order. Also, coincidentally the emotional and physical trauma she recovering from is mirrored in this couple's relationship. As she watches her character begins to unravel emotionally and physically. Can she survive this haunting and learn what happened to the prior occupants? Brittany is believable and great in this role. Watching this knowing that she actually dies in a highly weakened state in a year is eerie. Overall though this is barely an average horror film.

The actors do at least try hard with this dull-as-dishwater ghost story with a by-the-numbers script and uninspired directing, but alas it's not enough.

The film doesn't really have flaws significant enough to point out, but nor does it have anything really positive going for it either. There's virtually no attempt to weave anything interesting into the work. Every camera angle, movement, and even the set-design of the house are as predictable as the plot and dialogue. The scares are mild to non existent, the "mystery" is telegraphed so far in advance you can practically write the conclusion in an sealed envelope at the outset and pretend you did a magic trick to your friends. By the time the end credits roll you're already forgetting the movie.

Writer/director Sean McConville seems to be far out of his depth even creating a simple four-character ghost story. According to IMDb listings, this may be his first attempt at a movie... in which case we could probably cut him a little slack, but holy-hell he needs to try harder with his next attempt.

The first thing I noticed about this movie was it's soundtrack. It's barely there. I mean it's there but it's so quiet you don't realize that you've been listening to it until it blasts out for a sec or two & then goes back to lurking just below the radar. It adds to the sense of dread that permeates this movie. Brittany Murphy doesn't look well at all in this movie & I hope that's because of the needs of the character & not because she was sick. She is effective though. So is Thora Birch in her part. I can't say much more about it without ruining it but I will say it might be a ghost story or a Psychological thriller. That is up to the viewer. I have my opinion but I'm not going to bore you with that. You know what they say about opinions don't you? Oh, by the way this is one of the quietest movies I've ever seen. Ever. It adds to the atmosphere greatly. Give it a shot, you might be surprised....