Sickhouse, The

The old Ludgate place is a labyrinth of dusky passages, all of them looking alike (it saves on set decoration), dim and dirty. Most of the movie has the characters wandering about the old place and getting killed in obviously brutal ways. Plus, we get all the usual clichés: cell phones no longer work, someone or some thing mysteriously bricks up the doors, the one guy with a video camera "sees things" through his viewfinder that others can't see, and so on.

To its credit, "The Sickhouse" doesn't give away too much too soon. Instead, it plods along with glimpses, hints, of fleeting things, content in trying to build a sense of suspense that never develops. Basically, the movies offers up a set of disposable characters in a wholly incomprehensible plot. There's not much here beyond the dusty hallways.

Video:
The video quality is a little hard to judge on this one because you see so little of it. The director intentionally chose to make this a very dark picture, with shots purposely drained of color, favoring grays, blues, browns, and blacks. Indeed, the screen is practically black-and-white most of the time. Thanks to this muted color palette, object definition tends to get obscured in the shadows. In its favor, the image probably looks about as good as it can look, with no apparent added noise, grain, halos, or such.

Audio:
The soundtrack on the disc pretty much steals the show. If you turn off the video and just listen for ninety minutes to the audio, you'll probably get more frightened than if you watch the movie. For audio choices you get Dolby Digital 5.1 and Dolby Digital Stereo Surround, but, obviously, it's the DD 5.1 to which I'm referring. It uses the rear channels more extensively than I've heard in quite a while, with all manner of creepy noises enveloping the listening area. I especially liked the dripping water, the creaking boards, the eerie voices, and, of course, the musical ambience enhancement. You also get a wide dynamic range, a reasonably deep bass, and a strong impact.

Extras:
You won't find much here beyond the very minimum of extras. There are sixteen scene selections, six Sneak Peeks at other New Line and Warner Bros. titles, English as the only spoken language, and English and Spanish subtitles.

Parting Shots:
Ho-hum. Another garden-variety horror flick looking a lot like dozens of other horror flicks that have come before it. While "The Sickhouse" is atmospheric enough and sports a terrifically spooky soundtrack, the movie fails to generate any momentum, any tension, any suspense, any excitement, or any thrills. Instead, it relies on dark shadows, weird noises, and constant repetitions of things going bump in the night to pound the viewer into weariness. There is only so far a set designer and a sound engineer can take a motion picture.

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