Okwui Okpokwasili as the Woman in ‘The Woman in the Yard’, directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Photo: Universal Pictures.
‘The Woman in the Yard’ receives 5.5 out of 10 stars.
Opening in theaters on March 28th is ‘The Woman in the Yard,’ directed by Jaume Collet-Serra and starring Danielle Deadwyler, Okwui Okpokwasili, Russell Hornsby, Peyton Jackson, and Estella Kahiha.
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Initial Thoughts
Okwui Okpokwasili as the Woman in ‘The Woman in the Yard’, directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Photo: Universal Pictures.
‘The Woman in the Yard’ was held back from critics until literally the night it started playing in theaters, which is usually a sign that a film is so bad that the movie studio doesn’t want any reviews going up before its release that could dampen the box office. Sometimes the studio’s fear is warranted, but at other times the reticence is baffling.
The new horror film from Blumhouse and Universal, ‘The Woman in the Yard,’ falls somewhere in between: this is a handsomely mounted and often beautifully shot movie from director Jaume Collet-Serra, whose recent output has included both a fun if silly action flick (‘Carry-On’) and a turgid superhero dud (‘Black Adam’). Collet-Serra’s early films were horror titles, including the bonkers ‘Orphan,’ and here he wrings some decidedly chilly atmosphere from the initial premise and good performances by a cast led by Danielle Deadwyler (‘The Piano Lesson’). But ‘The Woman in the Yard’ rapidly falls apart in its second half, losing coherence and sense while also trying to tell a story about sorrow and crisis. In trying to go for both genre shocks and emotional depth, it succeeds at neither.
Story and Direction
(L to R) Director Jaume Collet-Serra and Danielle Deadwyler on the set of ‘The Woman in the Yard’. Photo: Universal Pictures.
Ramona (Danielle Deadwyler) is deep in the throes of grief, guilt, and depression following the death of her husband David (Russell Hornsby, seen in flashbacks) in a car accident that also left Ramona on crutches with a broken leg. The rural farmhouse she and David bought is falling into disrepair; Ramona hasn’t paid the electric bill so the power is out, and her teen son Taylor (Peyton Jackson) has to fire up the stove with a lighter to cook breakfast (eggs and Doritos) for his little sister Annie (Estella Kahiha) before what little food they have spoils.
Things take a darker turn when a woman (Okwui Okpokwasili), wearing a black veil and shroud-like garments, inexplicably shows up seated in a chair in their front yard. When Ramona goes outside to ask who she is, the woman replies with a question of her own: “How did I get here?” she asks dazedly. Although she refuses to identify herself or lift her veil at first, she eventually has an ominous warning for Ramona: “Today is the day,” she intones. “You called and I came.”
Tensions within the house rise as the woman seemingly draws closer, while the family dog goes missing and the inhabitants of their little chicken coop meet a grisly fate. Taylor wants to confront the woman himself, or short of that, drive to a neighbor’s house, but the car won’t start. (Why people in horror films often think that buying an isolated house with no one else around is a good idea, especially when they have kids who would maybe like to play with other local kids, always baffles us.) And then the woman gets even closer and the house itself comes under siege from her spectral presence.
Director Jaume Collet-Serra on the set of ‘The Woman in the Yard’. Photo: Universal Pictures.
Collet-Serra gets his best material out of the opening scenes of the movie, aided by strong performances from Deadwyler and the kids as a family falling apart at the seams. There’s a thick layer of dread in the air once the woman appears, and her dark presence against the bright sky and vast field outside the house is both jarring and surreal, reminiscent of similar tableaux in films like ‘The Innocents’ and ‘Let’s Scare Jessica to Death.’
But this isn’t enough material to sustain even this movie’s relatively brief (88 minutes with credits) running time. What might work on paper as a ghostly short story gets stretched to the breaking point in the second half, with Collet-Serra deploying a number of standard shocks as the script comes completely unglued. What exactly is happening? It seems pretty clear that the woman is either a supernatural or psychological manifestation of Ramona’s anguished state of mind. But if this is all psychological, then why can the kids see the woman? Why does poltergeist activity start occurring in the house?
It eventually comes around – sort of – to some revelations that lay out what might be really happening, but even though Collet-Serra and Stefanak reach for some profundity, the film has become too confused with what’s real and what isn’t to make the impact they’re aiming for. Horror doesn’t always have to be explained or knowable – that’s often what makes it frightening – but there does have to be some internal logic. ‘The Woman in the Yard’ dispenses with that. Some might call the film ambiguous; we’ll just call it incoherent.
Cast and Performances
(L to R) Taylor (Peyton Jackson), Annie (Estella Kahiha) and Ramona (Danielle Deadwyler) in ‘The Woman in the Yard’, directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Photo: Universal Pictures.
As with many horror movies made for a price these days, there are just five actors in ‘The Woman in the Yard.’ We never see anyone else or even get a sense of where this family is living. We know that Ramona is an artist who has stopped painting out of grief, but as is often the case in modern horror movies, where everything stems out of trauma, she is solely defined by her pain. Danielle Deadwyler does as good a job as she can with such thin character development, making the depths of her sadness and grief palpable and intense, even through her physicality; but that’s the whole of her being. There’s one scene later on that adds a new wrinkle to what she’s going through, but it too lands as more confusing than anything else.
Peyton Jackson and Estella Kihara are also quite good as the kids, the latter cute as a button and painfully sympathetic as she’s caught in the crossfire between her headstrong brother and short-fused mom. Jackson effectively catches the conflict in Taylor between being a rebellious teen and wanting to step up as the man of the house. And then there’s Okwui Okpokwasili as the woman, a strangely conceived role that she manages to infuse with some gravitas and existential menace before the story turns her into a more standard monster.
Final Thoughts
Danielle Deadwyler as Ramona in ‘The Woman in the Yard’, directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Photo: Universal Pictures.
As we stated earlier, ‘The Woman in the Yard’ does benefit from some of the early style that Collet-Serra gives it, supported by the cast, Lorne Balfe’s stirring score, and some lovely cinematography from Pawel Pogorzelski. It’s a nice switch to see a horror film unfold in bright sunlight (although this movie eventually goes dark too) with some striking imagery. But the movie’s rather languid pace and reliance on atmosphere and psychological pressure is at odds with the rapid-fire, mish-mash editing and shock-horror jolts of the film’s third act.
It almost feels like ‘The Woman in the Yard’ is fighting with itself and losing its grip as it tries to extend this material into a feature-length story. By the time it was over, as compelling as it starts out, we were ready to get outside ourselves.
“Don’t let her in.”
A mysterious woman repeatedly appears in a family’s front yard, often delivering chilling warnings and unsettling messages, leaving them to question her identity,… Read the Plot
What is the plot of ‘The Woman in the Yard’?
A grieving, deeply depressed widow (Danielle Deadwyler) and her two children (Peyton Jackson and Estella Kahiha) wake up one morning in their isolated farmhouse to discover a mysterious veiled woman dressed in black shrouds sitting in their front yard and issuing a warning: “Today is the day.”
Who is in the cast of ‘The Woman in the Yard’?
- Danielle Deadwyler as Ramona
- Okwui Okpokwasili as The Woman
- Russell Hornsby as David
- Peyton Jackson as Taylor
- Estella Kahiha as Annie
‘The Woman in the Yard’ opens in theaters on March 28th.
List of Jaume Collet-Serra Movies and TV Shows:
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