It seems like every few years there is a new "hot" horror director who everybody thinks has found the magic formula, bringing the same level of thrills as the classics but doing it in a fresh new way. Most of these filmmakers fade away into straight-to-DVD land or into making survival horror video games. It's a hard genre to crack, but occasionally one director appears and proves he's truly worth keeping a close watch on. Although he's been around for years, Ti West's biggest break came with 2009's creepily retro The House of the Devil, which was so good a number of critics had it in their top 10 of the year. When was the last time that happened? His follow-up, The Innkeepers, is similar in that it's a twist on a familiar theme, that of the "haunted hotel". Even more, it shows that West isn't content to indulge in the gruesome, or fall back on lame jump cuts for cheap scares. Instead he relies on good old fashioned tension building and humor to make for a moody, effective thriller.
The Yankee Pedlar has seen better days. The old hotel is creaking to it's final weekend before being turned into a parking lot. The place is basically abandoned, with even the owner not caring enough to stick around. Even his choice in who will manage the place to it's inevitable fate shows how little concern there is for the old, supposedly haunted building. Claire(Sara Paxton), a perky, asthmatic cherub with a runaway imagination; and Luke(Pat Healy), a smart mouthed wannabe ghost hunter struggle to even keep towels handy for the few remaining guests. One of those is Leanne Rease-Jones(an unrecognizable Kelly McGillis) a former actress turned psychic/soothsayer, who puffs her cigarette and fingers her power crystal between disapproving glares at Claire.
West structures his film in three short chapters, and those who are used to a constant barrage of loud "booms" and crashing piano keys might want to go home and watch their copy of The Grudge. The West has the feel of an old TV horror anthology, or an episode of The Twilight Zone. It relies mainly on atmosphere, and giving us a peek inside the minds of the characters we'll be terrified for later. In this case, boredom and idleness have taken over Claire and Luke's brains, with the emptiness of the building not helping the situation. Luke has put together an upstart website focusing on the paranormal, and Claire has become obsessed with the story of a woman who was left for dead in the basement and continues to haunt the hotel. While a little meandering, these first two chapters never fail to be attention grabbing, with West's script keeping the tone light, the casual banter between Paxton and Healy often hilarious and even a little flirty. Well, as flirty as it gets for two such social outcasts. He clearly has a thing for her, but she's way too spacey to notice or care.
There's a very thin line between comedy and terror when it comes to genre flicks like this, and West walks that tightrope with ease. His use of humor might seem out of place, especially for such an extended period of time, but by the time the final chapter rolls around you realize it was all done for a purpose. Your defenses lowered and all too relaxed, the genuine scares of the final chapter hit you like a sucker punch to the gut. West sets us up perfectly, with some fantastic camerawork, from long tracking hallway shots to some brilliant use of angles to keep us totally in the dark. Even when the film appears to be drifting along, there's a foreboding air just beneath the surface. When Luke starts warning Claire about the dangers of chasing ghosts, that she'll start to become paranoid, we know it won't be long before that very thing happens. But what fun it is to watch as it does!
The best horror filmmakers are masters at playing all of the audiences emotions to maximum effect, and after only a handful of films, Ti West has proven himself to be one who can.
