The Quiet Ones (2014)

title: The Quiet Ones
directed by: John Pogue
written by: Tom de Ville, Craig Rosenberg, Oren Moverman, John Pogue
photography by: Mátyás Erdély
music by: Lucas Vidal
edited by: Glenn Garland
cast: Jared Harris, Sam Claflin, Olivia Cooke, Olivia Cooke, Rory Fleck-Byrne
imdb

If there's a name that makes horror fans chill (not a person name) that name is Hammer. Along with American International Pictures (Roger Corman's company), they created most of the great horror films of the 60s and the 70s. But they both  disappeared at the end of the 70s: AIP's last production is from 1980, Hammer's last production from 1979... Until 2008, when Hammer came back. After several minor films, Hammer produced The Woman In Black in 2012. Hammer's last movie, so far, is The Quiet Ones.

The Quiet Ones feels like an homage to Hammer's history; set in 1974 and with a seventies psychological horror ispired plot, it could have perfectly been shot in the golden age of Hammer. A camera operator joints two students and a Profesor who are trying to prove that the paranormal phenomena are only a product of the mind and pychokinetic powers, and this way, help a young girl who is apparently contacting some entity.

In order to prove this thesis, the Professor has designed an experiment in which the girl is secluded in a room, forced to hear loud music, and then takes part in seance sessions. The goal is to prove the existence of telekinetic energy, and capture it.

The young camera operator is hired to document the experiment.

But the events that occur, make the three young members of this crew begin to doubt if the thesis of the Professor could be wrong and the strange phenomena that they are witnessing has nothing to do with the young girls subconscious.

Simultaneously, the young cameraman is feeling more and more attracted by the young helpless girl.

The Quiet Ones is a pretty good tribute to seventies horror. The seventies look is perfect, the atmosphere is really achieved, and the script and direction are solid. It is true that the story has some quite elemenetary misty elements (specially concerning the theory of the Professor) but being the subject what it is (the unknown) we don't expect a mathematical resolution.

As a confession, I will say that psychological horror is my favorite one, so I really love proposals like The Quiet Ones, in opposition to the blood bathered killer orgies of the eighties. I hope Hammer doesn't stop making movies again, specially if they are like The Quiet Ones.