A Haunting in Venice

⭐ 8.0/10

(Originally written by Joseph)

Watching a spooky movie in November is basically like watching a Christmas movie in January, but this was Jess's choice and I'm nothing if not an accommodating husband. So imagine my shock when, after an hour, Jess said she couldn't watch anymore because she was too scared, and I wanted to keep going!

I thought this movie was pretty great. Pretty standard murder mystery stuff, but it was legit scary at times. The tone of these movies are usually a little more campy, similar to Knives Out (complete with a detective with an outrageous accent), but this movie got really dark really quick. It is similar to the standard Scooby Doo formula where there seems to be supernatural occurrences, but our rational detective must get to the bottom of all this. But some of these scenes will give you nightmares.

Anyways, I thought it was good. The solve seemed a little quick and out of nowhere, but otherwise it hit mostly all the beats you'd want. My minor complaint is, what was going on with these accents? They are in Italy, but nobody speaks Italian. They are mostly white, speaking with British accents, but does that simulate speaking Italian? How about our detective with a French accent? Is he speaking Italian with a French accent? Or the woman with a Chinese accent? Is she a mystical foreigner? And how about the one Italian with an Italian accent? Or Tina Fey who is American, and speaks like a woman from the forties in exactly one scene? I know it's stupid, but I always get caught up in these accent inconsistencies. What is going on here?! Why is this set in Italy if none of the characters are Italian?

Anyways, still a good movie.