Most successful modern horror movies that do not follow a super-tight genre guideline come with a special kind of elegant simplicity. Early films from James Wan are bursting with it. Now, David Buckner is showing a similar tendency and The Night House showcases it really well. In a straightforward story of Beth, a woman who loses her husband to suicide only to gradually find out that he might not be completely gone, Buckner elegantly tackles all kinds of fears.
Some of them might point to the unnatural, but others are very much grounded in the real world and its woes. Chief among them is loneliness and the sense of isolation, even when with other people. At the same time, The Night House is also very crafty with its mystery part, which works almost outside of any horror environment. Here as well, Buckner is focused on the tactile nature of things like strange architectural notebooks with potential gateways to some other place. The final excellent element of this great horror film is Rebecca Hall, who does Beth masterfully, yet keeps her very much grounded and believable. The same thing applies to the movie as well.
