Well acted with a first-rate cast, the first hour of Inhabited (2003) relies on suspense without special effects, & the story is quite good, though it's familiar territory. A young family buys their dream-home, & their daughter soon appears to have an elaborate fantasy life with invisible friends.
The parents are slow to believe her friends are real, & slower still to understand that when people spoke of "the good people" it was only to placate what are at heart dangerous & harmful fairies.
The little girl's playmates are particularly powerful in & around the little playhouse in the backyard, a weird miniature cottage that, it turns out, is older than the main house, & sits on the mouth of an entrance to the creatures' underground lairs.
When the horrible fairies are finally unleashed they are kind of a let down after waiting so long for anything to happen, & oddly the only really impressive spooky moment with the fairies was when they were having a "pleasant" tea-party with the little girl -- that was Romanticist, horrific, & very beautifully staged, though it lasted scant seconds.
Overall it was nice to see a horror film that wasn't exclusively about bloody FX & was for a change competently performed. But I couldn't help but feel there was an even better film implied by the script than made it to the finished product.
copyright © by Paghat the Ratgirl
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