'Intruders' is Painfully Hollow.

In the event that the bars are set high, an aspirant film will in great chances disadvantage. Like for starters, 'Intruders', is a film that belongs to the family of Spanish spookers: 'The Others', 'The Orphanage', 'Julia's Eyes' and the most commendable of them all, in my opinion, 'Pan's Labyrinth'. All of the mentioned were better than passable horrors and the latter is outstanding, misfortune that is that the event that these films have set high expectations among the audience, now an aspirant film like 'Intruders' will be in great chances...doomed. You may take note of my redundancy, go ahead.

An ambitious pair of tales we are told by director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo--one set in his cultural home, and the other in Britain. In Spain, a young boy is bothered by a supernatural entity that is easily described as a "hollow faced" creature--if it is a creature that is. In London, a young girl is fidgeting on the same situation as "Hollow Face" as both children call it, becomes more dangerous and threatening. Mildly peculiar, both Juan (Izan Corchero) and Mia (Ella Purnell) were inspired to write about the force that's been hunting them each night.

Automatically, both children's parents are determined to find ways to put the nightmare to stop. In different locations, John Farrow (an impressive Clive Owen) and Luisa (Pilar López de Ayala) does find ways of their own to somehow decrease their children's struggle. John, going for the path of science and medication, Luisa, getting help from the exorcists. There are loads of things that parents did, but "Hollow Face" refrained from being stoppable.

So many films that delight us in the beginning: for instance the first part of the film. Our eyes are delighted with the opening sequence. Sumptuous cinematography, gritty editing and subtle performance from the actors...that fares throughout the movie, smooth sailing, until we reach the climax. If those films delight us in the start, they are to disgust us in the end. The film's conclusion evidenced the deprivation of the film from valid logic. It's like a puzzle with the most weird and absurd missing piece.

The material is rather passable than its ambitious claim as "good". Perhaps what happened is that the technicality is very good, so good, but fatefully, the fright didn't seem to be as loud as the rest of the elements. Awesome camerawork, dialogue and acting we can commend the film for that. Probably it isn't the director to blame, at all. You can think that the screen writers were drab of logic when writing the climax that in the process of running into, the events started to become predictable rather than astonishing or at least startling like it's supposed to be. The revelation in the end is easily accessible. But at the end of the day, you can't really blame anyone for such cataclysmic event. The material has been sent and published to the world and there may have been delight, and of course, disgust.

Half of the time I have satisfied my crave, the other half, I lost my appetite. Whether or not 'Intruders' did a good job in technicalities, it is such a misfortune to realize that it is painfully hollow in terms of efficient scares.