FROM HUNGER TO HORROR
What is Katniss doing in a dive like this?
House at the End of the Street
★ (out of 4) Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Elisabeth Shue and Max Thieriot. Directed by Mark Tonderai. 101 minutes. Opens Sept. 21 at major theatres. 14A
It was a dark and stormy night.
Yup, that’s usually when longhaired, blue-eyed children decide to attack their parents with a hammer, although in this case, mom and pop are given more than fair warning by their homicidal offspring’s noisy, lumbering approach.
Their ineptitude at averting their own bloody demise is rather symptomatic of The House at the End of the Street itself, a thriller with a twisted ending that feels clumsy, laboured and unconvincing throughout.
Fast forward four years and mom Sarah and daughter Elissa have just moved to start a new life in small town Woodshire and hoping to mend a difficult relationship. But even this plot point — in the hands of two very capable actresses, Elisabeth Shue and Jennifer Lawrence — comes across as tepid and tiresome.
Maybe there’s something more diverting happening next door at that infamous house — typically, the neighbours complain about the depressing effect that the murders have had on property values — and where sole survivor Ryan is living alone.
Ryan (played by Max Thieriot as if he has just awoken from a nap) and Elissa begin a gentle, circuitous courtship. Their chemistry is like two massive supernovas colliding. No wait, sorry — it’s the diametrical opposite of that.
Director Mark Tonderai leans heavily on ominous music throughout to rouse the audience from its torpor, making every scare — big or little — seem as manufactured as assembly-line widgets. It doesn’t help that the script by David Loucka and Jonathan Mostow, which borrows heavily from a whole slew of much better horror films, is laden with dialogue that incites laughter when it’s clearly not intended and with minor characters who take us nowhere. It’s an unfortunate misstep for the red-hot Lawrence, filmed in Ottawa in 2010, before her 2011 Oscar nomination for Winter’s Bone and this year’s leading roles in The Hunger Games and the TIFF-approved Silver Linings Playbook.
Here, Lawrence can do very little with the wretched material at hand, other than use those amazing eyes to alternate between self-assurance and surprise.
Shue, who plays a busy doctor, never misses an opportunity to run her fingers through her curly, blond locks as she vacillates between pensive and aggrieved.
Canadian Gil Bellows, who plays a likeable local cop, might as well have a target painted on his forehead because you know he won’t make it to the final reel. This degree of predictability is seldom a plus.
The climax is so ham-fistedly handled that it is unsatisfying and ridiculous in equal measure.
Built on a foundation that is lame and shoddy from basement to attic, this is one House that deserves a wrecking ball.