Review - The Orphan (2009)

So I just saw possibly one of the strangest horror movies that I’ve seen in a couple of years. It was “The Orphan” and all I can say about this movie was: Wow!!!! What the fuck did I just watch and why did I like it so much? The movie centers on a family of four who is recovering from a miscarriage and the mother adapts a very shy young girl… unfortunately, this girl proves to be highly disturbed and she has a secret she is hiding.

From Blogger Pictures

First off, lets start with the horror aspect of this movie. This movie builds up so much tension and sets up so many different camera angles to a point where you think something will jump out at you but nothing really happens. But, there were a few ‘jump-out’ scenes and some events were pretty disturbing. I won’t give anything away but there is one really freaky scene near the end that involves a black light and for some reason it just gave me chills. Though, giving the material this movie can easily be a slasher/thriller kind of movie.

What I also enjoyed about this movie was that it was sad, it had a storyline to it and it had a real legit family issue and this was a real family trying to cope with things. There were very touching moments and even some really heartwarming scenes with Esther. You can sort of compare this to some of the Japanese horror movies when it comes to family issues and morals but some of the scenes, I won’t name them, were just down right funny and over the top.

From Blogger Pictures

All I can say about this movie is that it was a thrill right that had you saying, “What the fuck is going on” at almost every point in the storyline. The girl who plays Esther does a fantastic job of being downright creepy and sadistic and whether or not she is from Russia… she really had a good Americanized Russian accent. You have to go into this movie with an anything-is-possible mindset otherwise you’ll be disappointed. What I can say is, I wished Jimmy Bennett’s character died. Is that wrong for me to wish that?