I love getting these indie reviews through. The latest is called Our Happy Place, for which we had a trailer for recently. It looked interesting.
Our Happy Place stars Raya Miles, Paul Bickel, Tracie Thoms, Eugene Byrd, Allyson Faso, and Carmen Serano. Bickel also writes and directs.
The Story
The ‘short’ synopsis for the movie is:
Raya wakes in the forest, cold and confused, with no memory of how she got there. Each day, it happens again. By the third day, she wakes in a shallow grave. The graves deepen each time, as if an unseen force is burying her alive.
Back in her cabin, she’s haunted by visions of tortured women whose screams echo in her mind. Night after night, her visions intensify, blurring the line between dream and reality. As the hauntings intensify, Raya must confront a horrifying truth that shatters everything she had believed.
Honestly, I can’t say anymore. I never like to spoil movies (unless I need to save you all the time), but this synopsis of the movie sums it all up. As with most stories, it has to unfold at its own pace, and it’s about following the main protagonist.
Raya is an interesting character, and I couldn’t help but be intrigued by her. Why was she waking up in the middle of the woods? Who was the lady she kept seeing?
The Cast
As I said, in Our Happy Place, the main player is Raya, and she carries the movie well. She’s interesting enough to be engaging, while you find out what the heck is going on. As with most indie movies, Our Happy Place has a small budget and people who aren’t big names.
There’s nothing wrong with this; a good movie is a good movie. Even more interesting is that Our Happy Place seems to be Raya’s first movie for acting, according to the IMDb. I didn’t know this when I watched the movie, and now that I do, I’m impressed.
The other main character, Paul, the director, spends most of his time in bed. From the trailer, he’s in a coma (or something like it) and being cared for by Raya. I liked how he wrote himself in bed for most of the movie.
Our Happy Place plays out, with a ‘now and then’ timeline, where we see flashbacks of the couple’s time before the ‘now’ events of the movie. This was done well, some of it was ‘home movies’ while they were on holiday.
Overall
Our Happy Place is another solid indie movie, which isn’t anything outstanding, but a good effort. Some of the photography is pretty creepy in places, and I didn’t see any CGI, I think.
There were a few moments that I hope were practical effects. If they were CG, fair play, as they were nicely done.
The downside is the jump scares. I’ve never been a fan of jump scares, they are an ‘easy out’ to make you jump and feel ‘scared’. Of course, you jump when something jumps out on the screen and there’s a big noise/clash of music.
When I think of movies like the first Halloween, John Carpenter didn’t do this, well, not that I can remember. It’s been a while since I’ve seen the movie, so I may be wrong. What I do remember, though, is how he would set up a scene, with two characters talking, then the Shape would walk along in the background.
No jump scare, no hit of music, it was just creepy…if you were paying attention. In Our Happy Place, I couldn’t help but think that a good few of the jump scares, without any music, would have been far creepier.
If you want a break from Blumhouse horror, which just aren’t scary, you might enjoy Our Happy Place. It’s original, it keeps you hooked, although I found myself losing the story towards the end. I’m giving it a solid 3 out of 5 stars.
You can see Our Happy Place on VoD and streaming now.
