Estranged

Okay so on Amazon this movie is called Estranged, and here on IMDB it looks up as 'January'. Hey opening scene.... she was wearing a helmet! She should have been fine!!! James Cosmo is the ultimate father figure!!!! I've wanted him for my 2nd Dad since 1995's Braveheart!!!!!! :) +1 Star when the newspaper clip is passed under January's door!!! Things are kicking up a notch!!!!! -1 Star for when girl runs she runs right in the direction of where she needs to run to find what she finds, and then dude knows exactly which direction she did run in order to catch her +1 Star for the painting, and for the 'treatment' by the sister!! +1 Star for the ending....it could have gone either way, but the ending was well done and appropriate from one side! 7/10

It's difficult to put into words really. For half of the film i could easily puzzle out where it is going but also I have no idea what the actual plot was. I THINK she was sort of held captive in this house by her stepdad who drove her mother to suicide but then also the step dad and his family all pretended (for no reason I can think of) that they were all related by blood (because he has his own wife and kids). Which is weird because who and when did he meet this new wife? Their kids are all grownup but he was also step dad to our protagonist? WHAT?! I'm probably just dumb but I can't get my head around it.

I've seen movies like this and this is on the more confusing side. I feel like the plot is so uneven and the characters, especially the main one, January, are really dull. I don't know, I guess I missed something while watching but don't think I'm going to watch this again.

Callum (Simon Quarterman) and January (Amy Manson) vacation in Brazil until they kiss an automobile with their scooter. Callum gets a scratch while January loses her memory and the the loss of her legs. They return to her childhood manor where she can't remember any of the creepy people or more importantly why she left in the first place. Things become weird as they always do in this type of film. I liked the name January, named for the god Janus who looks both to the past and future. Very clever. The problem is that this genre has been so overdone, there is nothing else clever that they bring to the production. I was bored for most of the film waiting for the scary secrets to reveal themselves, not even interested in the clues...which were mostly head fakes, as the characters were miserably portrayed and lacked depth. The DVD cover of January with a gun was a bit of a plot spoiler as that scene doesn't come to late in the film. It was a film I have felt I have seen before a half dozen times and didn't enjoy it then. Guide: F-word (spoken and written) rape. No nudity.

What went wrong? When I see a terrible movie, I tend to think that it's poor direction or poor storytelling. I think there's some story problems with this movie that are unsolvable. The main character is in a house with evil people, and it goes on and on, and nothing happens. Sure, there's a plot, but they spend an hour doing nothing. You don't create suspense when your audience already knows what is happening. There is no point in watching a main character express surprise or shock at the situation that is already obvious. For me, the main problem is that this person has no reason to be with her family. There is no legitimate reason for her to be recuperating with these people. That's giant problem in terms of the story.