by Allisonnnnn Wednesday 18th July 2012

This Geek in Netflix: The Legend of Lucy Keyes

Kids, you’re going to have to forgive me for this review, as I’m still coming down off the high of Comic-Con. And by “high”, I mean total lack of sleep.

“I’m done with your imaginary friend horseshit, Lucy.”

While digging through the horde of Netflix Instant movies, I discovered The Legend of Lucy Keyes, which had a fairly decent rating from its users and claimed to be about the haunting of a farm or some such nonsense. What occurred, however, I would not exactly call a “haunting” as much as random vaguely spooky occurrences that really didn’t impact anyone among the living in any significant way.

It started off promising with my preferred generic opener: scene setters placed alongside really nondescript music. Here’s a farmhouse. Oh, here’s another farmhouse. Here’s some leaves. Here’s a cemetery. Here’s a quaint town. OH, FUCK, IT’S A MOVING VAN ATTACHED TO A STATION WAGON/MINI-VAN/OTHER FAMILY-ORIENTED VEHICLE.

I like the classic clichédness of it all, as it reminds me of 70s horror films (i.e. a favorite of mine, Burnt Offerings) and it seems like it might have some promise at this point. In pursuit of contract that would enable him to build eight windmills on some countryside acreage, Guy Cooley (Justin Theroux) moves his wife (Julie Delpy, who I know from a brief period in my life where all I would watch was Disney’s Three Musketeers—don’t judge) and their two little girls move to an old farm deep in the middle of nowhere.

What I will give this movie points for is actually attempting to try to establish the characters before launching into the… hrm. It’s not exactly horror, as there isn’t anything really resembling a scary moment. Huh. Wait, I know! Launching into the brief interactions with the not-so-recently deceased who don’t really seem all too unpleasant, honestly. Sure, they’re a little loud at night and cause flashbacks, but other than that… very few unpleasant side effects.

Stays up at night wishing he had got the Comic-Con Derpy pony.

However, when you bring in the crazy neighbor, Judd Jonas (Mark Boone Junior – Robert Munson from Sons of Anarchy), and his Cruella deVille-like cousin, Samantha Porter, (Brooke Adams), suddenly ghosts aren’t needed for the horror factor anymore, as Porter does her best to keep the audience’s something-ain’t-right-here-sense tingling.

This film felt lacking for me. Delpy was the workhorse of this film, pulling it with all her might (and a sexy accent), and Theroux definitely pitched in at times, but the overall effect was still somewhat lacking. For a little over an hour and a half, I kept waiting for this movie to hit its stride and it never really did—all the pieces were there, they just weren’t assembled quite properly.