Absentia (2011)★★★☆☆

There’s a lot about this movie I like. It’s an earlier Mike Flanagan film, so there’s a lot of interesting direction and story. There are definitely some scary moments here.

But for a movie less than an hour and a half long, it feels really slow. Slower than most Flanagan films (and definitely slower than the Flanagan series episodes!), so I found it hard to get really into.

I thought the acting was great. I like Katie Parker (Callie) in most of what I’ve seen her in, and I thought Courtney Bell (Tricia), who I don’t really know, was good in this. Plus there’s a brief appearance by Doug Jones!

There’s an interesting story here, and I think it’s mostly well told, but as a movie this one kind of drags on too slowly to really build up its own tension and scares.

If you’re generally a Mike Flanagan fan, I don’t think you need to skip this one, but you also don’t need to seek it out or anything.