A refuge couple from South Sudan escape the war-torn country and manage to make it to England. They lose someone very close to them on the journey when something happens to their escape boat. Dealing with this grief and loss, they wade through the rigors of the immigration system to finally learn that they can conditionally stay in the U.K., but they have to follow certain rules. They are given a run-down house in a bad neighborhood and a stipend. At first, they are both thrilled to have made it this far, but soon, a darkness that has been following them makes itself known. An evil spirit from their homeland has attached itself to them, and is now not only haunting their flat, but their minds, as well. The entity is driving a wedge between them and they must fight back, but how? Teetering on the edge of insanity, the spirit world threatening their lives and the outside world threatening them with a return to their homeland, they must team up together and fight this evil, or die trying.
His House is a terrific film. First off, the fresh perspective of writer/director Remi Weeks brings some interesting variations to what would otherwise be a pretty standard haunted house story. The South Sudanese heritage and folklore add a new twist on the proceedings. You’ve got racism, the struggle to integrate into a new society, governmental bureaucracy, and terrible living conditions, all playing adversarial roles for the couple, long before the supernatural even starts to oppress them. So on this level alone, it’s interesting and unique. But then the haunting starts, and now our characters are not only dealing with the “mundane” cares and troubles of the world, but also with a witch spirit that is using their grief and loss and terrible, terrible inner pain, against them. Oh, and on top of that, you have some top-notch scary moments. One minute you’ll be shivering, the next screaming, and the next feeling a lot of empathy for what they’re going through, just on a human level. The ghosts here can be taken to mean many things; a manifestation of their own guilt and suffering, an actual curse that has followed them, a representation of the intolerance and racism of their new home, or all three rolled into one. It doesn’t matter ultimately because in the end, like anything in life, they have to learn to live with the ghosts that haunt them.
This is a perfect example of taking a genre and trope that is well-trod and making it something new by simply adding your own, unique voice and experience to it. This seems so simple but is hard to pull off, and Weeks not only gets the job done, but makes a real cracker of a film. Working on many levels, from human grief and suffering, all the way up (or down) to ghostly chills and thrills, His House is a complete success.
★★★✮
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