Terrified (2017)

Posted By: brian@brianschell.com July 28, 2022

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a brilliant one, well-written, perfectly cast with excellent special effects. The story jumps around in time and place a bit to make it extra interesting. Subtitled and worth the watch and read.

Synopsis

A woman does the dishes, but hears something under the sink. Or is it coming from the drain? She cancels dinner because she hears voices in the kitchen. Her husband listens in and doesn’t hear voices. She says they are going to kill her. Credits roll.

Later that night, her husband hears knocking inside the walls. Juan thinks it’s Walter, the neighbor, but when he goes over there, there’s no answer. He goes back inside and thinks maybe Clara is doing the banging. Spoiler: She is.

The next morning, he’s under interrogation, as he tries to explain that he didn’t brutally murder Clara. They say they believe him, as there was an identical case in America back in 1998.

We flash back to Walter, who pleads to Doctor Albreck’s office on the phone that he’s having some weird problems at home. The woman in her office says the doctor isn’t available. He goes home, and he, too, hears sounds in the pipes. As soon as he gets to sleep, his bed starts moving. There’s something in his room, as he hides under the covers. In the morning, he calls the doctor again, but again, the doctor refuses his case. That night, he sets up a video camera in his bedroom; he wants proof of what’s been going on. He gets his proof; there’s literally a monster in his closet. He gets a gun and opens the door, but there’s no one in there. Wait, yeah there is someone there. Walter screams.

A little boy gets hit by a bus in front of the house, and Juan and Clara go to investigate. It’s their friend Alicia’s son.

Jano gets a call from Funes. We recognize him as one of the investigators. He’s calling because of the accident. Meanwhile, Alicia starts hearing banging in the pipes. The police called Jano and Funes about the condition they found Alicia in. There are little boy footprints all over the house, and the dead kid sitting at the table. He’s been dead four days. Funes thinks he saw the decomposing child move at one point. His hands are all torn up from clawing his way out of the grave. It could be a case of body snatching, but he doesn’t really think so. While they’re not watching, the child spills his milk on the table. Jano suggests just burying the body and not telling anyone; Alicia might be arrested.

Jano spots Mona Allbreck outside, taking photos of Walter’s house across the street. He knows she’s a specialist, and he invites her over to look at the dead child. Jano tells Funes to buy two bags of concrete to keep the kid in the grave this time. Jano says that he’s encountered strangely undead people before. She shows him the photos taken by Walter’s camera. “I wouldn’t come all the way here if I had my doubts,” she says. One of the neighborhood kids sees the dead child through the window, so they hide the body in the freezer until they can move it back to the cemetery.

So we cut back to Juan being interrogated. The interrogators are Jano, Allbreck, and Rosentock, a colleague of hers. They know a lot of this already, so they aren’t too skeptical. They want his approval to investigate further. Each of them decides to spend the night in one of the affected houses. The electricity in Walter’s house has been turned off, but Allbreck says it’s better without lights. Funes is with Rosentock, and he’s terrified.

Things start moving around at Walter’s, and Rosentock is injured. There’s activity at Alicia’s house as well. Allbreck, in Juan’s house, starts to pick up things with her instruments. The creatures can be seen and not seen at the same time, depending on your point of view. Funes has had enough and leaves the house. He goes across the street to where Jano is and finds Jano injured. He goes to see Albreck, who tells him not everything he’s seen is real. There are coexisting dimensions, and sometimes things cross over. As they talk something reaches out of the wall and kills Albreck.

As Funes lies there with severe chest pains, the creatures start crawling around in the room. Alicia comes in. and he begs her for help. She blames him for taking her child away; she’s seen the videos. Oh, and she’s dug up her child again. Funes decides not to get into the car with her. He runs to his car and drives off.

He calms down, thinks about it, and goes back to the houses. He sets them on fire.

Juan is brought before three new investigators. Then the police station goes haywire, “You brought him with you,” Juan announces.

Commentary

It’s really good. you don’t know where it’s going, but it’s got weirdness galore. The characters are all played realistically, the music and sound is good, it looks fantastic, and the creatures are unique. There are lots of jump scares, but there’s lots of genuine creepiness too; it’s all good.

I liked it a lot.