The Skeleton Key

Personally, this movie fell more into the four star category for me, because it featured a good story, great acting, suspenseful and frightening scenes, and an interesting twist ending that I did not expect. However, realizing that I sometimes don’t see twists that others work out within the first five minutes, and fully aware of the fact that I am a willingly jumpy viewer, I’m placing Skeleton Key in the three star range for most people. A good movie to be sure, and even more so if one is predisposed to the idea.

Caroline (Kate Hudson) is a hospice care worker in New Orleans, who, seeking to make a real difference in someone’s life, takes a job caring for Ben (John Hurt), a man who recently suffered a debilitating stroke that left him completely paralyzed and unable to speak. Ben and his wife, Violet (Gena Rowlands), live in a somewhat run-down antebellum mansion, which is isolated in the midst of the Louisiana bayou about an hour from New Orleans. The house is predictably creepy in the way that an old mansion with too many rooms for just two people would tend to be, yet it retains its southern grandeur. Ben is completely unable to speak, and yet at every opportunity he seems to convey to Caroline with his alert and ever-moving eyes that he desperately needs her help. As Caroline snoops around the old house in that typically maddening horror movie fashion, she discovers a hidden room in the attic that is overflowing with voodoo-esque items. Growing more and more suspicious of Violet’s dubious intentions toward her husband, Caroline consults with her southern-raised friend, Jill, who tells her about hoodoo American folk magic, which is supposedly harmless as long as one does not believe it. Jill warns Caroline that even though she doesn’t believe in hoodoo magic, she shouldn’t mess around with it—Jersey-girl Caroline of course does not heed Jill’s warnings and instead continues to investigate things with escalating danger.

Each step in Skeleton Key’s progression is deliberate and systematically heightens the sense of foreboding and suspense. What I really liked about the movie was that it played upon the audience’s existing fear of magical voodoo practices and beliefs, with frightening imagery and a sense of the unknown. The southern culture played heavily as well, as it becomes more and more apparent that Caroline is simply a northerner who has stumbled upon something she cannot understand. I guess they just don’t practice much voodoo/hoodoo in New Jersey. Whereas all of the previous southern-raised care workers quit the job before becoming entrenched in the situation, Caroline continues to investigate, not having the cultural instinct to tell her that she is in danger. She insists to herself that hoodoo is simply the power of suggestion, a psychosomatic symptom that can be cured with a scientific approach. The audience hopes as Caroline does, that she can rescue herself from the situation using this approach, but it increasingly becomes clear that she has dismissed forces that actually do have the potential to harm her.

As I said, I thought this movie was frightening and suspenseful, and I liked the unexpected twist at the end. The concept of the story is creepy, and it appeals to both those who are superstitious and those who are not. It had the usual startling moments that one would expect from a horror movie, but what left me with a lingering sense of unease was the very idea behind the movie itself. If you enjoy supernatural and suspenseful movies then I definitely recommend Skeleton Key.