(2005) ***
“Sometimes inheritance is a curse.”
A relatively unknown Chinese/Taiwanese tradition is the raising child ghosts. Apparently affluent families purchase a dead fetus and feed it blood from a family member in order to claim the ghost’s power as their own (?). It has been said that if worshipped properly a child ghost is a powerful tool that can be used to increase the family fortune as well as vanquish the family’s enemies for generations. One drawback to raising a child ghost is that its care can never end or the ghost will become vengeful.
As The Heirloom opens a mass suicide occurs in the affluent Yang household, where the entire family hang themselves at the exact same hour, place, and height. Only one member survived and her whereabouts are unknown.
Twenty years later James Yang is delighted to learn that he has inherited an old, dilapidated, mansion from these deceased relatives in Taipei (northern Taiwan). He moves into the immense house with his girlfriend, Yo, and they celebrate their first night with their best friends, Yi-Chen and Cheng. As the night grows long Yo and Yi-Cheng begin exploring the mansion and eventually go up to the creepy attic where they find pictures of the Yang family covering the wall. Yi-Cheng, a reporter, takes some pictures of the wall for a possible future story.
The next day Yi-Chen suddenly appears in their house at midnight and Cheng is found dead from hanging in his bathroom although no rope is found. Night after night Yi-Chen keeps appearing in the home without any recollection as to how she arrived there. Eerie things begin to happen to others who have any contact with the house (Grudgy things). Eventually Yi-Chen and Yo begin investigating the disturbing events associated with the mysterious mansion and uncover the truth about Yang’s ancestors.
You can see the J-horror stamp all over this Chinese film, although I believe the raising of a ghost baby is strictly a (rare) Chinese tradition. Despite all the trappings of a potentially great horror film, The Heirloom falls short for some reason and I’m not sure why. The story is unique, the cinematography is appropriately dour, there are a few good scares, yet something didn’t click with me. Perhaps the characters are a bit underdeveloped, making their survival less important to me, but it’s more likely the case that I’m starting to experience J-horror burn-out. After watching dozens of these films over the past decade I’m finding that they simply don’t induce feelings of dread that they did previously.
4 comments:
I reviewed this in the past and felt about the same. I did give it a half star higher rating but said this, "A dark and ominous air surrounds the entirety of the film adding to the mystery as it slowly unfolds. If the film has a fault it's that it was kind of draggy in the investigative portion"~Maybe the pace was the problem. It's not all that memorable so I would say that just confirms the so-so rating.
taiwanese people buy dead babies?'
that's a way more damning stereotype than eating dogs.
I like the phrase "Grudgy things." And also not being such a biddy that I actually know what that phrase means.
Part of me wants to protest J-horror burnout because I remember the thrill of discovering J-horror's vibe in 2003 and I never want that to go away. But yeah, Japan sure knows how to take a concept and beat that dead horse until even the chalk outline on the pavement disappears.
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