(2007)**
Hannah Sloan slips into a deep depression following a car accident, which results in her young son falling into an extended coma. Flashbacks reveal that she was responsible for the car accident and her guilt consumes her. Heeding the suggestions of her therapist, who hypothesizes that a change of scenery might help, Hannah along with her husband Graham decide to relocate to the small town where Hannah grew up. Soon after moving into their new fixer-upper Hannah begins to experience both auditory and visual hallucinations including visions of a young boy who converses with her in her dreams. Her husband chalks it up to posttraumatic stress disorder but eventually he too cannot deny that something weird is happening in their new home. While speaking with her elderly neighbors during a chance encounter she learns that her house was once the site of a tragedy years earlier. A little digging around at the local library reveals that a boy her son’s age who shared her son’s name went missing one day and was never found. Some amateur sleuthing reveals a startling connection between Hannah and the missing boy.
Grindstone Road is an overall dull “haunted house” story with zero original ideas. The characters, particularly the husband, are unlikable, and the story moves at a glacial pace. There is little character development, which makes it difficult to invest any emotions into Hannah’s plight. Even when everything is revealed it is done so through spoon-fed exposition. The schmaltzy ending is entirely too predictable. I’m giving the film an extra star because it has nice cinematography and the fx are adequate.
