Struggling to come to terms with the death of her mother, Kim suddenly has to deal with a new mother in her life. Choon, Kim’s father, brings home a woman one day and announces his decision to marry her. A series of mysterious and terrifying incidents start to occur at the family home after their return. Could it be the jealous spirit of Choon’s dead wife that has come back to show her displeasure at being replaced? Or is there something more sinister? What unravels is a tale of unspeakable evil that threatens to destroy the family.
Ghost Child is commendable where it really counts for horror movies: the scares are well set-up, and some of the recurring images used – like a Chucky-esque doll that turns up in unexpected places – are genuinely spine-chilling. While only spotted in the last minutes of the film, the titular ghost child is a pretty horrifying sight, even for those acclimatised to horror movie scares. Unfortunately, Ghost Child suffers primarily from a lack of tension due to its focus on unnecessary sub-plots. Despite its short 88-minute running time, the film feels less like a tightly written narrative than several episodes patched together Von Frankenstein style. The script ranges from the generic to the slightly corny, although young lead Woo and veteran actor Chen acquit themselves well enough despite the hamminess of certain lines.
Story-wise, much is unexplained – which is either puzzling or mysterious, depending on your perspective – but at least there are no lulls in the narrative whatsoever as any excess is trimmed to a minimum to keep the action moving. On that score, the film succeeds. Chan makes the mistake of assuming that slowly revealing the terrifying moments will lead to a greater payoff. But his slow-burn approach will only put off viewers and cause some to yawn endlessly. (From left) Cecilia Heng, Jayley Woo and Chen Hanwei visit a memorial centre in 'Ghost Child'. The strained relationships between family members are also nothing new. There's Kim (Jayley Woo), 15, who is failing her exams and is picked on by classmates. She hasn't been able to get along with her businessman dad, Choon (Chen Hanwei), since the death of her mum two years ago. The relationship gets even more strained when the father brings home a pretty Indonesian Chinese called Na (Malaysia's Carmen Soo). His mum (Cecilia Heng) takes an instant dislike to her.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SrAVSD0DBE
Ghost Child is a mundane exercise in horror, but adding some fright elements early on could have made it more enjoyable. A creepy night for Jayley Woo. The strained family ties are as old as the North Pole. The acting is mediocre at best. Even the toyol making an appearance is blase. The film manages to be effective in terms of delivering scares (without almost any gore whatsoever) due to dynamic editing and an excellent sound design. Wow, have I ever sounded more fickle when it came to a horror film? For me, it’s thumbs in the middle but if you venture out to see this film, you may go away liking more about it than I did.
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