The Woman in Black is largely familiar territory, even for someone like me who generally avoids scary films; a spooky house, a lead character with a troubled past and a ghostly woman looking for revenge. However the film takes all these conventions and beautifully crafts them into a story that is both frightening and engaging.
Daniel Radcliffe is competent in the role of Arthur Kipps, a solicitor who is sent to deal with the paperwork of Alice Drablow, shortly after the death of his own wife. Looking haunted and anxious were both skills Dan used in abundance within Harry Potter and while it isn’t his fault that he is called to use these again in Woman in Black, I do want to see him being stretched a little more in future projects. There’s nothing wrong with his portrayal; he carries the film assuredly and at no point do you doubt his ability to be a caring and protective father although the solicitor element is sometimes less convincing, if only because of his stature. He does, however, look very good in the period costumes, so there’s definitely eye candy factor to consider, if Dan is your kind of man.
Dan also gets to share a lot of scenes with Ciaran Hinds as Sam Daily and it is this friendship that’s really the centre point of the film. Given his brief appearance in Potter, it was nice to see the two acting alongside each other for a longer period of time. The two compliment each other well and you get the impression Dan learnt a lot from working with him.
An important feature of the film is the jumps and scares, which aren’t always as frightening as you might expect them to be. It plays on audience fear and suspense rather than being overly visual all the time, which is effective and literally had me tense the entire time. It is very much a film of shadows, reflections and things that move in the background.
The story itself is properly creepy, with the Woman in Black seeking her revenge in varying degrees of horror, enacting cruel fates upon the children of the village because she feels her son was wrongly taken away from her and died in the care of her relatives. Arthur seeks to allow her to rest and thus stop the killings in the village by reuniting the ghost with the body of her son, which was lost in the muddy marshes and never recovered.
Visually the film is stunning; from the sweeping landscapes to the haunted house, from the forest to the village, it is all shot in a glorious way that really pleases the eye. The cinematography is truly gorgeous. There’s a lot of comedy too, surprisingly, however this could be unintentional. Much comes from the, at first, apparently overtly hostile locals, whose behaviour I have been assured is pretty normal for country villages, the murder of children not withstanding.
The Woman in Black is a solid, scary ghost story that should stand the test of time as a classic, straight forward, frightening, spooky tale.
The Woman in Black releases in the UK on February 10th and in the US on February 3rd.
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Review: The Woman in Black 
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