“Today’s the daaay…“Sing that little assurance to yourself, and now imagine it being said in a terrifyingBlumhousemovie. The latest offering is simply calledThe Woman in the Yard, which some may argue is already an iffy start. For others, the title might successfully evoke eeriness, especially for anyone who’s ever lived out in the sticks and perhaps dealt with a shady trespasser. “Hey Mom, there’s a woman in the yard,” says the young girl in act 1 (hence the title, for all you haters).
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serraand written by Sam Stefanak, this new monster-in-the-house feature is kept tight at just 85 minutes and still manages to utilize some of your favorite fright-fest devices with Dutch angles and high-concept editing to boot. It’s too bad the third act gets lost in its own craziness, but maybe horror junkies can be forgiving this time around.
Get Off Her Lawn
The Woman In The Yard
A suspenseful thriller centered on a mysterious figure who regularly manifests in a family’s front yard.
The film opens eerily on an iPhone video of a happy couple, which, of course, becomes a thing of the past in any given horror movie. We see hubby David (Russell Hornsby) joking around with loving wifeRamona (Danielle Deadwyler)about exciting plans they’ve concocted for their new house, plopped on an expansive farm.We quickly learn David is no longer around, and Ramona is now singlehandedly raising teenager Taylor (Peyton Jackson) and his younger sister Annie (Estella Kahiha). It doesn’t help that Ramona hobbles around on crutches, having suffered a leg injury which later reveals something about her marriage’s traumatic past.
Then, of course, “the woman” (Okwui Okpokwasili) appears on their property one fine morning, seemingly out of nowhere. The family dog goes berserk. The woman doesn’t move a muscle. Is she dead? A figment of everyone’s imagination? Conveniently, Ramona’s iPhone is now dead, and the house’s power is out — oh, and they live on a secluded farm with a busted truck, so it’s not as simple as, “Drive down to the McKenzie’s and ask for help” (movie reference, anyone?).
The Woman in the Yardslowly becomes psychological horror from there, with jagged editing and head-spinning camera angles to match.Who’s really going insane here, now that this strange woman — dressed for a funeral — is now magically inching closer and closer to Ramona’s fixer-upper residence?
Danielle Deadwyler’s Best Movies and TV Shows, Ranked
Though she’s currently making waves with Till, Danielle Deadwyler has had several outstanding performances in movies and television.
Deadwyler Is the Star of the Messy Show
The ferocity in Deadwyler’s lioness eyes could perhaps only be matched by those of the late, great Chadwick Boseman.The leading lady here is nearly able to getthe Blumhouse vehicleback on track, but things sadly run amok in the messy third act. Even for a tight runtime, the whole end sequence ofThe Woman in the Yardcould have been tightened up. Any momentum the horror-thriller had — riding off stellar post-production that might just be showcased in college editing courses down the line — fizzled out once things ground to a halt. Guess we’ll have to wait forBlumhouse’s upcoming offerings likeM3GAN 2to see if those will pack more of a punch.
That’s not to sayThe Woman in the Yarddoesn’t have its fair share of strengths, especially those genuinely frightening moments throughout the film’s first half. Plus, a certain flashback sequence that neatly peeks into Ramona and David’s past, before tragedy struck, was an appropriate slowdown as the film broke into act 3.More of that edgy dynamic between the troubled husband and wife could have beefed up the payoff at the end. But hey, if the audiences end up going for this one at the box office, here’s our pitch for a sequel:Women in the Yard.
In the meantime, from Universal Pictures,The Woman in the Yardis now playing in theaters.
