Things Heard & Seen Faces the Horrors of Privilege and Gaslighting Directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini
Starring Amanda Seyfried, James Norton, Natalia Dyer, Rhea Seehorn
8
Calling Amanda Seyfried s character in
Things Heard & Seen a nervous-wife type would be to misread this multifaceted character. Nothing like the meek, saccharine mother archetype we re used to seeing in the many adaptations of the
Amityville murders or in the
Conjuring films, Seyfried s Catherine Claire is a charming, angry, endlessly relatable woman who is haunted firstly by her husband and secondly by her house. This upturning of a tired trope is a guiding theme in
Look a little deeper at just about any decent haunted-house movie, and you’ll almost always see a story about people who feel trapped by some larger aspect of their lives. Horror-movie protagonists dealing with an evil doll can at least try to get rid of it; slasher victims can at least try to run away from the danger. And people being threatened by something they don’t understand, whether it’s a curse or a creature, can always investigate and try to come to terms with the unknown. But a house represents a commitment, a sunk cost that’s extremely difficult to walk away from. In a movie like Netflix’s baffling new horror-drama
Things Seen & Heard debuted on the platform this Thursday, April 29th and it’s instantly shot up to the top of the charts to be crowned the most popular film on the site the world over. A blend of horror, drama and mystery, the pic stars Amanda Seyfried and James Norton, as well as featuring the likes of Natalia Dyer and Karen Allen.
Things Seen & Heard follows Catherine Claire (Seyfried), an artist who relocates to the Hudson Valley and discovers that her marriage to husband George (Norton) hides a sinister darkness, one that’s rivalled by the shocking history of her new home. Based on the novel
Review: Netflix s haunting Things Heard & Seen proves that Amanda Seyfried is the scream queen we deserve theglobeandmail.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from theglobeandmail.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Availability
Netflix April 29
Things Heard And Seen is based on a novel, translated for the screen (and slightly renamed) by genre-hopping filmmakers Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini (
American Splendor). The result has the blunt faithfulness of a Lifetime Nora Roberts adaptation; whenever the camera turns toward, say, a horse or a bird, the assumption is that this was a rich symbol in the book, rather than the random cutaway it appears to be here. The early ’80s setting remains evocative, however, moving young intellectuals Catherine (Amanda Seyfried) and George (James Norton), along with daughter Franny (Ana Sophia Heger), from Manhattan to upstate New York home of spiritualism, art colonies, and drafty old farmhouses at the beginning of the film.