The Walls Have Secrets in This Film

I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House is a film by Anthony Perkins's son, Oz Perkins, and he does a great job drawing us atmospherically. The opening scene features a very slow and stretched out image of Polly--her body is ghostly and blurry as it creates an expanding mirage. An excellent and unprecedented shot, for sure. Throughout the movie, Nurse Lily (Ruth Wilson) who is caring for an aging and almost bed-ridden novelist (Iris Blum), is quite nervous about the house as she suspects that it is being watched by a ghost (Polly). Very little happens in this movie. It is slow. It is quiet. Even Lily herself moves slowly and quietly. Interestingly, in spite of its snail crawl, the pacing doesn't negatively affect the interesting psychology of the camera movement. I counted five times in which something a bit startling happens, so for a thriller, there is hardly any at all. Instead, our focus is drawn toward Lily as she moves throughout the house washing dishes or staring at the strange mold on a corner section of a wall, but mostly our attention is on the house itself as the camera pans cautiously from room to room. It's never quite clear why the film is given its title; there is a small conversation between iris and Lily about one of her novels, but even that doesn't seem like enough of an explanation nor is it clear why Lily uses a voice over or why the film ends the way it does. So while the film is visually unique, Perkins does leave us with a mystery of unanswered questions.

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