After this years Insidious 2 and The Conjuring its about time we got a decent horror flick to watch and A Haunting in Connecticut 2 proves to be a reliable and sufficiently creepy tale of belief and misinterpretations as a family is haunted by a past event that has taken ahold of their countryside property.
The film follows the Wyrick family as they move into a new home in the country. When they arrive Lisa (Abigail Spencer) finds herself seeing things she thought she had put behind her as her husband Andy (Chad Michael Murray) and daughter Heidi (Emily Alyn Lind) begin experiencing strange occurrences all over the property, something that may hark back to the old underground railway on the land prior to the Civil War.
Beautifully filmed with bright vivid colours and a wonderful grasp of light. As the film story starts to get darker the colour changes to blacks, greys and browns as the light begins to disappear from the property that used to create joy for this loving family. The use of colour to enhance storytelling isn’t unique but there is no arguing that it isn’t well used in this picture.
Spencer and Murray make a good pairing as Spencer struggles with her belief in the other worldly elements of the story as things start disintegrating around her, including the close relationship she has with both Andy and Heidi. In fact Lind makes Heidi a realistically feisty character, someone unexpected in a film of this genre, adding certain freshness to this predictable ghost story.
Katee Sackhoff pops up as Lisa’s sister Joyce to provide the films much needed comic relief but her character seemingly disappears when anything important is happening making the audience question her importance as part of the family as they proceed to insult, mock or abuse her as she tries to help them.
Director Tom Elkins has a good grasp of the films story and the theme of belief as the film becomes a story about Lisa’s stubborn choice to ignore the monsters that are at her door until it is too late. Spencer makes this struggle believable and heartfelt while never detracting from the films electric pacing as the film rockets to its creeptastic finale with aplomb.
All in all, this second tale in the series proves better than its predecessor and a darn sight better than any of the other ghost stories released this year