SummaryReeling from the unexpected death of her husband, Beth (Rebecca Hall) is left alone in the lakeside home he built for her. She tries as best she can to keep it together – but then nightmares come. Disturbing visions of a presence in the house calling to her, beckoning her with a ghostly allure. Against the advice of her friends, she begins diggin... Read More
Directed By:David Bruckner
Written By:Ben Collins, Luke Piotrowski
The Night House
Metascore
Generally Favorable
68
User score
Generally Favorable
6.6
My Score
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Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
68
72% Positive
26 Reviews
26 Reviews
28% Mixed
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Aug 18, 2021
100
Taken either as a metaphor for mourning or as a straight-up fictional narrative with a paranormal bent, The Night House’s ending is as disturbing — and intriguing — as it gets.
Aug 19, 2021
80
The director, David Bruckner, doesn’t just mindlessly apply the electrodes; even when he jars you to attention, he always seems to be drawing you into something deeper and more atmospheric. He delivers a scare you can sink into.
User score
Generally Favorable
6.6
62% Positive
67 Ratings
67 Ratings
31% Mixed
33 Ratings
33 Ratings
7% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
Apr 6, 2025
9
It's a psychological horror film, not a pure horror film. It's about 85% figuring out what's going on and 15% horror. That said it's a really good film and tells an interesting story. The acting is also pretty good from some actors I'd never heard of before.
Jul 14, 2024
9
There's enough good will in the pace and execution and steady hand in the first act of the film to allow me to forgive the horror movie cliches I hate surfacing as the film ramps up. But for every step backwards there's a creative, sneaky and surprising double step forwards. Casting Sarah Goldberg from Barry as the best friend, with the baggage she brings from Barry, makes her a great uncertain and unpredictable foil. And even before the movie begins to flourish there's engaging human discussion and deep, nuanced characters and relationships and Rebecca Hall acting her balls off. It seeds in its mystery and its direction well so I won't spoil it here. Suffice it to say that the best of these kinds of horror films are at once predictable and then surprising and The Night House delivered for me in spades.
Aug 19, 2021
75
In The Night House, narratively faulty but full of insinuating shivers, Hall once again expands her range. She intensifies what could’ve been just another woman with a flashlight in a haunted house movie, peering into the beyond.
Aug 17, 2021
70
The Night House might not stick the landing, but it's an eerie supernatural chiller with an incredible lead performance from Rebecca Hall.
Aug 17, 2021
63
Given the chilling mood Bruckner strikes and dark corners he unearths, horror fans will want to spend some time in this Night House even if it’s not worth a long-term investment.
Jan 27, 2020
60
Though this tale of a new widow’s apparent haunting gets progressively lost in a narrative maze that’s complicated without being particularly rewarding, director David Bruckner suffuses the action with enough dread and unpleasant goosings to make this an above-average genre exercise.
Aug 20, 2021
40
Hall strives to carry The Night House on her more-than-capable shoulders, but she can’t quite compensate for the moments when the movie is outright silly or, worse, boring.
Dec 13, 2021
9
The first and the second act are very simply for a Psychological Thriller but directed and development in a very good way, and the third act has a lot of revelations that change the way of the movie and it gets bigger. The suspense scenes are great, at first they're involved in a lot of high sounds to get scared, but at the end the use of silence gets the best scenes of the film. The acting of Rebecca Hall is very good and the script is a little confuse but round and deep.
May 1, 2023
6
It all felt rather played out and familiar for the first 2/3, and I found the super loud jump scare noises even more annoying than usual given this is a film that presents itself as the more artsy, "elevated" type of horror. I wasn't into it. But then the last third won me back over in a major way. It went in some interesting and unexpected directions, and I found the way everything came together in the end to be quite satisfying. Apparently, a lot of people consider this film to be really good until it falls apart at the ending, but I feel the exact opposite. I would hazard to guess that I might enjoy this significantly more on a second watch now that I know what it's building toward and that the payoff is worthwhile.
Apr 13, 2022
6
It’s engaging enough but isn’t fully fleshed out and falls apart a bit in the third act. Some of the scenes with the ghost were down right silly and distracting. Definitely watchable though
Oct 18, 2021
6
It seemed to me that it was a tremendous shame that what this film was building, fell apart with such a weak conclusion. It's atmospheric, clearly depressing, and has an intriguing enough mystery to be interested about it, to see where it goes, yet the payoff at the end of the mystery seems undercooked, and The Night House is just competent. Nothing more.
Aug 31, 2021
3
With the exception of Candyman (I’ll review next week), most horror films these days involve some sort of evil spirit that’s haunting or possessing the protagonist (as opposed to homicidal maniacs). This film seemed to be setting its sights higher, but fell flat. Rebecca Hall plays a woman whose husband committed suicide. The film begins as she returns to their lakeside home, but then come the hallucinations. It’s peppered with typical mild jump scares and creepy specters, but is never scary or even tense. The revelations are never fully explored and to make matters even more unfulfilling, the ending is completely useless and confusing.
Production Company:
- Searchlight Pictures
- TSG Entertainment
- Anton
- Phantom Four Films
Release Date:Aug 20, 2021
Duration:1 h 47 m
Rating:R
Tagline:Get out of the house.
Awards
Fangoria Chainsaw Awards
• 1 Win & 5 Nominations
VHS Awards
• 3 Nominations
Hollywood Critics Association
• 2 Nominations
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