Housebound

Horror comedies often have a hard time balancing the chills and laughs, but New Zealand writer-director Gerard Johnstone's debut feature—which suggests that you can go home again, but perhaps shouldn't—juggles the scary and humorous elements very skillfully. Kylie (Morgana O'Reilly) is an angry young woman sentenced to eight months of home detention following a botched ATM robbery. Not long after moving back in with her chatterbox mother (Rima Te Wiata), Kylie begins hearing strange noises, and she enlists the help of the security man assigned to keep tabs on her electronic ankle bracelet to investigate—a search that eventually leads to an unsolved murder that took place in the house years earlier, and to a reclusive neighbor whose ramshackle abode was once home to a troubled boy who disappeared soon after the crime was committed. But Kylie's court-appointed psychologist tells everyone that Kylie is just suffering from emotional stress and shouldn't be taken too seriously. Housebound builds tension through excellent performances, especially from O'Reilly and Te Wiata, as well as astute editing (also by Johnstone), while offering some genuine shocks, many from clever plot twists. Aside from a final confrontation sequence pitting Kylie against an unlikely villain that goes on a bit too long, this is a surprisingly engaging movie that marks Johnstone as a genre filmmaker of real talent. Highly recommended. (F. Swietek)