Movie Review: “The Grudge” only brings back an unimpressive exercise in jump-scare horror

The latest Hollywood horror retread is “The Grudge”, a reimagination of the successful horror series from the mid 2000s. But this outing is not only unscary, but loses the appeal of a being a new avenue for suspenseful material that our first run was.

Detective Muldoon (played by Andrea Risborough), relocates to a small town with her young son, where she encounters a creepy house with a troubled history of making anyone who bonds with it go insane. It’s not long before Muldoon gets tied up in the mess and starts losing her mind in the process. We’re also taken on a journey with other families who have encountered the evil force in past years.

It’s not entertaining, resorting to regular jump scares to jolt its audience out of falling to sleep and the story jumps all over the place while failing to form one sincere bond with any of the characters. Who are these people? You’ll have to use your imagination.

The way Nicolas Pesce links the timeline and the stories is clever, but all it accomplishes is successfully connecting a very poorly done story. It’s short 94 minute run time in this case is also a good thing. It’s not a good film but at least it doesn’t go out of it’s way to waste your time.

Let’s hope 2020 gives us a scarier and more original journey to theaters this year.

The Grudge:

GRADE: D

Rated: R

Runtime: 1 hour 34 minutes.

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