Orfanato, El (The Orphanage) 2007

Lucifer_666 · Orfanato, El (The Orphanage) 2007

I'm looking forward to seeing this too if I can get it.....its a spanish film (subtitled) but its getting great reviews it was shown in a load of film festivals around the world and there is even talk of Oscars

The Orphanage is a slick and quietly chilling piece of work based around (what else?) an orphanage. A woman named Laura returns to the orphanage she grew up in as a child, with the intention of opening it up again as a home for children with disabilities. Together with her husband and son Simon, Laura tries to make the huge old building ready to
receive it's first new residents, but all is not quiet in the dusty rooms and grounds, and gradually she starts to feel sinister presences from the past making themselves known.

Here's a trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnHj8LxkcU0

Madamhoney

Hmm, sounds good. Funny I watched a Spanish film at the weekend called The Devil's Backbone which was also set in an orphanage, well, maybe more of a children's home cause some of them still had parents I think, just they were off in the civil war.
A new kid there senses a strange ghostly presence and eventually comes face to face with the spectre - woooo! LOL!

Lucifer_666

God the Spanish must have a thing about haunted Orphanages

Was it any good Honey?? This new film is getting rave reviews its apparently part drama too but disguised as a horror.........well thats the wway it was described in many reviews I read

Madamhoney

This was a drama really with a supernatural twist, it was quite good, I enjoyed it. Nowhere near as much as Pan's Lab though. The ghosty in it looked suitably unpleasant I thought, along the Asian horror kind of line.

Lucifer_666

It sounds very like the film I'm on about

obviously the Spanish have a thing about kids in horror dramas

I have never seen Pan's Labyrinth....is it good Honey????

Madamhoney

It's brilliant Luc! You should see it, really, really good. Again, set in the Spanish civil war - LOL! It's weird and freaky, and the cinematography is great. Some yucky moments in it too.

Lucifer_666

Oh I must get to see it now Honey sounds like my kind of thing

I have a list as long as my arm of films I have to see

Lucifer_666

This is the new english version of the trailer and it definitely adds to the tension..check this out!! I'm looking forward to this one....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GR6gWYvJiMA&feature=related

Catnapper

Oh, it looks very scary and I'll be looking out for this one too. When is it released?

Lucifer_666

Yeah it looks the business Babe..I think the kid in the mask looks creepy

Its already been released at festivals Cat..I'm hoping to get a download of it....I think it may be going to select cinemas ...I'm not really sure

Catnapper

I see it's being released early March in France and Belgium so hopefully we'll get it soon after that

Lucifer_666

Oh good stuff babe hopefully it will come out around then too

Catnapper

Here's some more info.....The movie was shot at the Partarriu manor in Llanes in the Asturias, a building that has been vacant for 34 years. "The house was eerie," said Sergio G Sanchez (the writer/director of Orphanage), "because the woman who lived there, her son got run over by a car right in front of the house. She said there were too many memories there and she left. But the house is as they left it 30 years ago. And when the soundman was doing the wild track of the room sound, he was like,'Quiet everyone, quiet. What's that?' Actually, most of the stuff you hear in the seance sequence, all those strange noises, are what they recorded. The restroom was on the second floor and everyone was asking 'Could you please go up with me to the restroom?' Nobody wanted to go there on their own!"

Very spooky!

Lucifer_666

Can you imagine grown men asking for others to hold their hand up to the bathroom

Sounds great though and creepy...it all adds to the experience of the film babe....it does sound like a good film

Catnapper

I'm waiting to hear the noises in the seance scene

Knowing it's actual recording will make it more scary!

Lucifer_666

Yep that bit has become alot more interesting now ...not that I would say an old house like that with creeking floors and pipes not to mention the filming equipment there would make significant noises though it willl be good to hear it

Lucifer_666

I seen The Orphanage (or Orfanato, El) the other night and I highly recommend it...its the best horror I seen in a while..... Director Juan Antonio Bayona does a fantastic job of building up the tension and horror, suddenly shocking you but also interlacing it with other emotions such as sadness and regret...why is it that the last few Horror movies that I rate highly have all got a gloominess mingled within aswell?
The plot centers around Laura....a woman who brings her family back to her childhood Orphanage home, where she wants to re-open for handicapped children. Her adopted son Simon, who has HIV, then starts to communicate with imaginary/invisible new friends which play a particular game of taken something that Simon cares about and leave trails and clues for him to find...However this takes a more sinister turn when Simon himself disappears without a trace. Leaving his parents to question has Simon's real parents taken him?,....Has some strange old woman that was hanging around got something to do with it?, or is there more to Simon's invisible friends in the house? Throughout the film Laura's husband Carlos is much more the sensible logical one thinking the answers must lie in the facts while Laura is much more open to the paranormal element...and retracing her past at the orphanage. I really don't want to say anymore except its well worth the watch and that if you can get your head around the language barrier thing and don't mind the subtitles at least at the beginning ...it won't be long before you forget your even reading them.....Oh and another thing the sight of a kid in potato sack mask may not sound creepy but trust me it is.......

Click to see full size image

Catnapper

Excellent film and the best I've seen this year. The acting, especially of Belen Rueda who plays Laura, is fantastic and totally believable.......you really feel her pain when her son disappears. To a certain extent her husband plays second fiddle in the film.......he's more willing to accept their son's disappearance after time, while she's desperate and will go to any lengths to find him....even calling in a spiritualist to the Orphanage (which leads to some scary scenes!)

The tension keeps you on the edge of your seat.....and it's one of those great horror films that I can highly recommend you go see.

Lucifer_666

Oh brill I'm delighted you enjoyed it babe...did you jump in certain bits of it?

Madamhoney

Hmm, can't say I was as enamoured as you Cat. I thought it was quite a good film, although me & my sister both thought it seemed really long (even if it wasn't) as it was a bit slow.
I didn't find it tense or scary, despite there being quite a few jump out your seat moments.
I don't know why it was, the atmosphere just wasn't there for me. Moments that should've been scary (spoiler!) like when she was playing that game where she knocked on the wall and turned round, that should've been really tense and scary but it wasn't, to me anyway.

I did like the end of it though. It wasn't something I'd seen coming so was a nice twist to the tale.

Overall I'd give it probably 7/10.

Catnapper

The same thing happened with Ils (Them) if you remember Honey! You thought Ils was very creepy and scary while I was disappointed it wasn't as scary as the hype suggested it would be! Maybe it's because Ils had a frantic pace while The Orphanage builds up the story over a few months after Simon's disappearance?

I agree about the ending though

Luc - Yeah I did jump at certain parts

The 1-2-3 knocking game for starters!

One thing though about Ils and The Orphanage.........they both take place in large houses with lots of rooms and corridors. Is that more scary than in a small house do you think?

Madamhoney

Definitely, you never know who or what could be hiding in those rooms. And the fact that some of the rooms will hardly ever be used, because unless you've loads of people living there it's just not possible to use them all regularly, then it's creepy to go in a room like that. They have a different atmosphere.

We obviously find different things scary - lol. I thought with that game it would've been far more creepy if, when she turned round it showed the kid in close up being nearer her. And at the end just before it touched her if she'd turned round and there were loads there all with their arms outstretched ready to grab her, that would've been far more scary. It just looked too normal to me to be at all creepy. But then maybe the normality of it would be the thing that to someone else was scary?!

Imagine though if she turned round and it just showed a close up of this kid with his arm out ready to touch her, filling up the screen. The feeling of dread would be far greater.

Lucifer_666

Yep I think its individual tastes at the end of day...I personally didn't find it long but I also loved the atmosphere and build up....
By the way I don't know about you ladies but one of the bits I wasn't expecting was the old woman scene....you know the bit when she calls out to her in the street

...I did jump

As for the scene with the 1 2 3 knocking game....I think the director was kind of mixing different types of horror film techniques throughout the movie and in fairness he probably could have done what you suggested there Honey but I liked the fact that you really didn't know when you were going to get the shock and what kind....yes having a child suddenly right behind her may have frightened lots and it is the obvious thing to do yet the fact he decided not to sort of added to it for me....
An example of what I'm referring to was the scene where she sees the boy in the mask, he walks towards her, it kind of lolls you into a false sense of security but in the back of your mind you know the scare is coming...and then it does!...But then if you take into account the scene I was on about earlier with the old woman, you are watching it relaxed and curious until the shock suddenly comes like a bolt out of the blue.

Perhaps I'm over-analysing it?

Madamhoney

Catnapper

When she kept doing the knocking game I expected to see children creeping towards her and I was straining my eyes trying to see them

so when the hand appeared I jumped!

Yeah the old lady on the road scene made me jump too cause I wasn't expecting it! She looked pretty gruesome too

Lucifer_666

Well I think by not giving you the shock it kind of left you more uncertain when the shocks would come...well thats my opinion

Oh well... everyone's tastes are different

I really did like the scene with the old lady alright

JohnG

This is one of this years films that I am excited about seeing. I am a huge fan of the horror genre (particularly the atmospheric and creepy ones) and am loving the films that are coming from Asia and Europe. The first time I saw the advert for this film in Empire mag, the little kid with a sack on his/her head combined with the words THE ORPHANAGE sent a real shiver down my spine.
This film was produced by Guillermo del Toro who was the director of both Pan's Labyrinth and The Devil's Backbone and he's also the guy who is going to direct The Hobbit, so that's something to look forward to.

Catnapper

I'm sure you'll love it John especially since you said about liking atmospheric and creepy films! It's one of my favourite movies this year

Lucifer_666

Yeah i have to agree with Cat John it was a favourite of mine this year too....you will like it I bet