The Hallows - Super Spoo00ooky!
"...these people have got certain beliefs." "Beliefs?" "They believe that the forest you're trampling on belongs to the hallow."
Adam and Clare and their baby, Finn have just moved to a small Irish village surrounded by a massive forest. Adam is a British conservationist and the family is not really welcomed in the village. As they settle in, Clare removes all the weird iron bars from the windows and Adam begins to explore the forest. He finds an abandoned house with a dead animal inside which he collects samples from.
Their neighbor keeps visiting and is super creepy and threatening but they choose to ignore it. That night something breaks into the baby's room and knocks over a lamp. Clare and Adam panic and call the police who tell them it was probably just a bird (??????? a drunk bird at that?!). But the officer does warn them of the hallows which is Irish folklore for fairies and banshees. Turns out their neighbors' daughter went missing in the woods and he believes the hallow took her.
The next day the neighbor comes back and leaves Clare with a creepy book, meanwhile Adam is in town and the shop keepers tells him they shouldn't have removed the iron bars, so whatever happens to them is their fault...."if you trespass upon them, they'll trespass upon you."
On the way home Adam's car breaks down and he's attacked.
And so begins the longest night of their lives as they fight for the safety of their child and hide from what can't be real....the hallow.
Alright...so what did I love about this movie?
I'm obsessed with the house they live in....dream home much?! Giant, old house in the middle of a forest?!?!
I love that they never really showed the monsters until the very end. It was all very hidden and spooky and worked incredibly well during the final reveal. There's a great and terrifying scene where Adam is taking photos of the house and catches a glimpse of the monster in the flash.
Love the folklore of it all!
Bojana Novakovic was a power house.
Overall?
I was quite excited for this one and it didn't let me down. The creatures give me some Pan's Labyrinth vibe realness and the story was simple but fleshed out. It was originally titled The Woods which I'm glad they changed because there's too many fucking "woods" movies. And even though the basis of this film is the "woods" it's more so about the age of the forest and the creatures that protect it.
Really spooky!
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