The Secret of Marrowbone ** (2018, George MacKay, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Heaton, Mia Goth, Matthew Stagg, Nicola Harrison, Kyle Soller) – Movie Review

George MacKay stars in The Secret of Marrowbone (2018) as a young English man called Jack who lives in an ancient American manor house with his three younger siblings (Charlie Heaton, Mia Goth, Matthew Stagg), who are keeping the death of their beloved mother (Nicola Harrison) a secret to remain in the house together.

All for one and one for all, then, but there appears to be a Monster in their midst… Further, equally vexatious, complications arise with a sympathetic young woman named Allie (Anya Taylor-Joy) who likes the look of Jack, but she is being pursued by the starchy youngish lawyer (Kyle Soller) who is supposed to be sorting out the family’s business.

Allie (Anya Taylor-Joy) is being pursued by the starchy youngish lawyer (Kyle Soller).

Unfortunately mother isn’t around any more to sign the legal papers for ownership of the mansion, and the kids can’t get a cheque ready for him for $2000, and he gets jealous of Allie’s interest in Jack, so he starts sniffing around the mansion. The truth is nothing like he, or most likely anyone else, could imagine.

Spanish writer-director Sergio García Sánchez tries hard to whip up this interesting set-up into a compelling yarn but he can’t quite pull it off. His screenplay is plagued with loose ends, plot holes and unconvincing and confusing developments. It just is not satisfying. He did much better with the screenplays of The Impossible (2012) and The Orphanage (2007).

Sánchez is trying for both an art movie and a genre chiller, which is fiendishly difficult to do. So he proceeds at a very genteel, sedate pace with painterly images and a romantic retro look (it is 1969) but punctuates with some shocks and scares, but these are not shocking or scary. This proves none too thrilling or fulfilling. In the end The Secret of Marrowbone would find a better home, and possibly more sympathetic audience, at the Curzon cinema than at the Odeon, but it is good that they are giving it a try to see if it can reach a sympathetic public. It has had the bad luck to open in London in a heatwave.

George MacKay stars in The Secret of Marrowbone (2018).

But it is worthy and watchable, thanks to the suspense generated by the need to know The Secret of Marrowbone, Sánchez’s easy, confident professionalism and the performances of a well-chosen cast. MacKay is particularly good but all the others are effective too.

[Spoiler alert] The Secret of Marrowbone is safe with me. I can’t say that I really saw it coming, as the secret is kept so obscure by every possible means, and mainly by showing you things that aren’t actually happening or haven’t happened, which is very irritating. But after it was revealed, and finally in a very clumsy device in case we still didn’t understand, I thought, oh yeah, and what else have you got?

I will say this, though, it looks to me like Sergio García Sánchez has been watching Psycho and Our Mother’s House. But, if so, he is getting inspiration from the right places.

It doesn’t take much to realise that it was not filmed in America. It does not look like America. It was shot at Asturias, Spain, and Terrassa, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. But this is not a handicap for the film, it just adds to the desired otherworldliness.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Movie Review

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Charlie Heaton was born on 6 February 1994 in Bridlington, Yorkshire.