Weekend viewing...

Finally got around to watching the rather good
Mystic River/a> last Saturday, and found it thoroughly entertaining, though it was by no means a great film. Despite that, there were sterling performances from Penn, Robbins and Bacon, with mature and sensitive direction from Clint Eastwood and a damn good script by Brian Helgeland. I've not read the book, so I can't really compare, but it's well worth a watch.

I also caught The Grudge/a> last night in the local multiplex and, to be fair, I was expecting it to be shite of the highest order, but was actually scared shitless most of the time. Like any decent horror film, it won't win awards for acting nor script, but relies on atmosphere - usually generated with use of sound and music (if you're after a perfect example, then check out Robert Wise's original version of The Haunting/a>) - and keeping the terror and dread very much hidden, allowing the audience to imagine the horror.

Here, The Grudge had a very good score courtesy of Christopher Young and some incredibly well-produced sound effects - okay, so you can tell when the big scream was going to come, but it still scared you regardless. It also helped the film was set in the original's home of Japan, and Sarah Michelle Gellar - though not winning any awards - made for an appealing (as always) heroine, who didn't descend into scream queen antics.

Of course, it had it's problems: the script had some terrible expositional scenes, which has an amateur screenwriter made me shake my head. But, apart from that, a decent and entertaining horror yarn. Will probably check out the Japanese original at some point...