The Creeping starts off like a Guillermo del Toro movie, involving a child being tormented by a ghost. The music, the tension, even the child actress does a fantastic job selling the fear of the moment. After this, we are thrown into an adult version of this tormented child who has to confront the cruel spirit of the past. It's a common theme in 2022 that movies are confronting generational trauma such as Everything Everywhere All At Once and Turning Red.
The Creeping explores similar themes using a ghosty tale as its backdrop. Family drama can be as scary as things that go bump in the night (ask anyone during Thanksgiving). Family trauma can be equally as terrifying if swept under the rug. Jamie Hooper and Helen Miles crafted a story that touches on these ideas, and while it might sacrifice its scares to do so, it's still an impactful first feature for Hooper as a director.
The film sets up a chilling opening involving a child named Anna being told a scary bedtime story before bed, followed by that same bedtime story almost happening exactly the way it was told by her father. The little girl hears a noise, furniture in the house moves, and she gets chased by the unseen disturbance. The atmosphere and setup here are done very well and it brings back that childhood fear of dark hallways at night. This is handled in the same vein as Poltergeist or The Sixth Sense.
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We cut to several years later and Anna (Riann Steele) is all grown up. She returns to the same home that caused her fear when she was a kid but for some reason, Anna does not seem to acknowledge that opening sequence for quite a while. The purpose of her return is to watch over her grandmother Lucy (Jane Lowe), who is suffering from a declining mind (dementia symptoms). The passing of her father Harry (Jonathan Nyati) left Lucy alone with no caretaker, resulting in Anna having to protect her grandmother in more ways than she realizes.
Being back in her childhood home, familiar things begin to happen. She wakes up at the same time every night around three in the morning. She hears her name being said quietly throughout the house. Her grandmother is heard speaking to someone who is not in the room. Basically, all the common red flags of a haunted house movie that should inspire a character to burn the home down and move a thousand miles away.
Once everything within the environment gets reintroduced, including the evil within the home, the script takes the character down a winding road of memories and issues relating to the problematic nature of her family background. And the result is a ghost story that dissects grief and family trauma through jump scares and tension building. Parts of the film reminded me of the 2020 horror movie Relic, which shows the pain of getting older in age through horror. But honestly, it has more in common with the film Hereditary, in terms of characters trying to face lingering family trauma in a horror movie (just not as psychologically scary).
The only issue is that the third act sacrifices its scares to reveal the threat terrorizing the home. This will be a make-or-break moment for some. James Wan's Insidious, for example, that movie had its fans, but the reveal of the demon did not work for everyone. Despite how silly it was in that movie, Insidious managed to overcome the reveal by possessing an insane amount of atmosphere with its score and cinematography. The Creeping does not have the same characteristics to overcome this in the final stretch and seeing the threat removes the fear we once had.
All this said, The Creeping did leave this writer thinking about his home environment after the film. The best horror spooks the audience long after the credits roll. Similar to Paranormal Activity, moments in The Creeping might make one feel insecure when they sleep in the dark or attempt to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. There are sequences that will remind some viewers of watching Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Hill House where it makes the watcher stare over the main character's shoulder questioning whether someone (or something) is there.
It's not a perfect film about a haunting but given all of this, director Jamie Hooper shows promise. The Creeping executes some impressive throwback scares that will linger in one's mind when they return home alone. It's a tad too familiar with those scares to a fault at times but it hits those familiar beats exactly as it should. And there is a decent script here that tackles some relatable issues that are unfortunately more common than most of us would like to admit. Do not expect a game changer and just buckle up for a decent ghost story about family trauma.
The Creeping is playing at Panic Fest through May 8th.