THE QUIET ONES [2014]

Director John Pogue joins the modern Hammer Horror films with The Quiet Ones, a spooky little tale about the attempt to manifest an angry ghost through a troubled young woman.
Jared Harris is better than the material he's offered with a layered performance that harkens back to the days of Peter Cushing, while Olivia Cooke is highly effective as the crazy girl that gives off a nasty case of the uber-wiggins.  It's bleak, washed-out photography looks like it creeped right out of the 1970's when it's not bouncing back into found footage territory which is distracting at best.  It's harshly edited and bumpy in it's narrative, giving off the feeling that it was the tortured victim of a studio re-edit and multiple script rewrites to diminish it of it's eerie atmosphere, that's present but not quite used to it's full effect.
The Quiet Ones delivers the scares and tense moments but not enough to be anything more than a cheap rental you'll forget about within a few hours.

2 warm palms out of 5

OPEN GRAVE [2013]

Sharlto Copley stars as a man who wakes up in a pit of dead bodies with no memory as to how he got there in Open Grave, a horrific mystery/thriller from Gonzalo López-Gallego (the guy who shat out Apollo 18).
The concept is mildly intriguing and with each reveal the story becomes more and more interesting, even if it all reeks of nothing even remotely original.  Fortunately the little surprises tossed in here and there somewhat hide the tired story and horrible dialogue which almost makes up for it all.
It's not a wonderful film by any means but an entertaining one for a single viewing and no more once all the twists are revealed.

2½ inconvenient places to hide one's keys out of 5