Unrest Review (Film, 2006) The Archives
A young woman enrolls in medical school to help herself find a logical explanation for why she can see dead people. It doesn’t work. The first cadaver she has to hack into in Gross Anatomy gives her horrific visions of murder and mayhem that soon come to life in her new hospital home.
Unrest is certainly not the most innovative ghost story ever told. Medical thrillers are a dime a dozen. Vague ancient spirits wreaking havoc, possessions, and demon-induced mental illness aren’t ground breaking, either. Yet, combined here, these common elements create a cohesive and effective vision of ghostly terror.
Unrest is one of the harder films to review. It doesn’t do anything particularly wrong or right. The acting is a little flat, but not distracting. Some of the gore is a little repetitive and, in some cases, unconvincing, but the gore is more of a visual representation of ghostly encounter than actual traditional bloodletting in horror. The score is used well, but it’s that same kind of tribal chanting and drumbeat that has been a mainstay in beyond-the-grave tales since King of the Zombies received an Academy Award nomination for original score in 1942.
What the film has going for it is good structure. Chris Billet and Jason Todd Ipson’s screenplay is solid. It has a traditional three-act structure for a horror film, including a mysterious introductory vignette before the credits to tease the mind and set up a well-planned twist at the end. The relay of new information throughout the student’s investigation into the cadaver is believable and quite suspenseful.
Like the original The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Unrest is the rare thriller that makes researching something in the library quite exciting. Coming from someone who has logged many hours researching bizarre subjects in libraries around the country, that kind of work is not exciting to watch. The only thing more dull to watch is someone write, and fewer films manage to make that interesting.
Unrest doesn’t revolutionize the horror genre. It doesn’t break boundaries or blow minds. What it does is present a well-planned story in a very clinical way. The camerawork is clean. The gore is minimal. The score pops up only when absolutely necessary and screaming onscreen is an absolute last resort. It is, in that way, a rather interesting spin on medical school horror. At least these students and professors actually use their heads and try to logically solve the problems they face with a potential unscientific haunting in the morgue.
Unrest is available to rent or purchase on all major digital platforms.
