Half Light

Melancholy, drama, romance, ghosts and thrills on the secluded British coast

After the death of her son and impending divorce, a successful writer (Demi Moore) moves to a cottage on the remote Scottish coast where strange, sometimes ghostly things start happening as she develops a relationship with the handsome lighthouse attendant (Hans Matheson). Henry Ian Cusick plays her husband, a failed writer, while Kate Isitt plays her close friend from London. Other important characters include a woman with second sight and the constable of the village.

As you can probably tell, “Half Light” (2006) is a drama/mystery with ghostly elements and even some thrills in the last act. I wouldn’t call it horror. It’s not far removed from films like “Dark Water” (2005), “The Wicker Man” (1973/2006), “The Fog” (1980/2005), “The Haunting of Seacliff Inn” (1994), “The Sixth Sense” (1999) and “Loch Ness” (1996). If you liked those movies you’ll probably like this one. It features a haunting ambiance combined with magnificent British coastal locations.

Early on there are a couple of predictable clichés, like a creepy event that turns out to be a nightmare, which itself is a nightmare, but this only happens once. At the midpoint there’s a twist that I didn’t see coming and another Hollywoodized one in the last act. Despite the magnificent locations, the first half is lugubrious and mundane with slow drama that pretty much morphs into a romance novel, but everything perks up with the twist in the middle. From there to the end it’s quite compelling.

Some viewers have complained about the unlikely conspiracy of the last act, as well as it containing too many uncertain variables. But it makes sense when you factor in the great success of a certain person and the “little foxes” of envy, bitterness and greed, not to mention other things that I can’t share without spoiling. As for the “variables,” they can be easily explained away when you consider the fluidness of the root scheme. It might be Hollywoodish, but Forensic Files shows that these kinds of diabolic trickeries aren’t as unlikely as we might think.

The movie runs 1 hour, 50 minutes and was in Wales and England (Cromwell & London), none of it in Scotland.

GRADE: B