The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

Don’t be fooled by Shut In’s relatively intense and spooky trailer; the final product is unfortunately, everything that its trailer is not. Directed by Farren Blackburn – see Hammer of Gods – this haunted house thriller of the wearisome is-she-crazy-or-is-she-not variety finds itself completely devoid of any suspense or story, resulting in one of the most painful and unexciting movie going experiences of the year thus far.

The story is set in rural Maine and revolves around child psychologist, Mary Portman (Watts wondering how the heck she managed to get roped into this mess), who is struggling to get over the loss of her husband who was killed in a horrific car accident some time ago. Left alone to take care of their teenage son, Stephen (Charlie Heaton from Stranger Things ), who was also in the accident and was left paralyzed from the neck down and unable to talk, Mary tries to do the best she can and to go about her duties as compliantly and passively as possible.

However, the pressure of taking care of him alone is slowly getting to Mary who tries to find some sort of comfort and solace from her regular Skype sessions with fellow shrink, Wilson (Platt). Her life is soon turned upside down when one of her troubled patients, a young deaf foster kid named Tom (Room’s Jacob Tremblay), shows up at her doorstep late one night before quickly disappearing into the cold without a trace. Wrecked with guilt, Mary soon begins to see evidence of Tom in the house; unable to differentiate between reality and her nightmares, her mind soon begins to play dangerous tricks on her, forcing Mary to believe that there is something else entirely at play here.

Told with an unintentional sense of preposterousness and accompanied by an obscenely sluggish tempo, instead of concentrating on building its own story and generating genuine tension, wastes time borrowing ideas from other, better-executed films. Attempting to ignite chills and creeps through a series of predictable and terribly clichéd jump scares, the story fails to excite, offering very little suspense, energy or reason for the viewer to get invested in its characters. Even the talented Naomi Watts can’t make up for its laundry-list of problems, while Room sensation Jacob Tremblay is disappointingly wasted in his role of Tom.

While the idea may have read well on paper, Shut In’s execution is dreadfully ineffective; uneventful, boring and a total of waste of both time and talent, watching Shut In ­­is just as exciting as watching paint dry. No fun at all.