Editor’s Note: This was originally published for FANGORIA on August 12, 2005, and we’re proud to share it as part of The Gingold Files.
It is said several times by the characters in The Skeleton Key that hoodoo—the Deep South gumbo of spellcraft and folklore at the base of the movie’s frights—only works on you if you believe in it. The same goes for the film itself: If you can accept the premise that in the real world, hoodoo is capable of conjuring up ghosts and other kinds of bad mojo, you might get caught up in its story.
Ehren Kruger’s script is also careful to instruct that hoodoo is distinct from voodoo, the latter being a specific, monotheistic religion as opposed to the former’s conglomeration of assorted spiritual influences. Presuming that everything in the movie accurately reflects hoodoo practices and not voodoo, it isn’t Kruger’s fault that past movies on the subjects have mixed and matched their trappings to the point where what’s on screen on The Skeleton Key doesn’t appear much different from countless black-magic chillers of the past. The incantations, mystical powders, animal totems—all are present and accounted for, along with a brief nightmare scene in which a character appears as what looks like a traditional voodoo doll.
Still, the occult elements are presented here persuasively (certainly more so than in Dimension’s upcoming Southern-fried schlocker Venom), and carry an element of menace that maintains a modicum of interest through the movie’s standard old-dark-house shenanigans. In a change of pace from her usual romantic-comedy persona, Kate Hudson is appealing if not overly compelling as Caroline, a caregiver who accepts a job helping middle-aged Violet Devereaux (Gena Rowlands) look after her husband Ben (John Hurt), who has been incapacitated by a stroke. At least, that’s the official story; the more time Caroline spends with Ben, the more it seems he’s terrified of—and might have been afflicted by—some malefic force lurking in the house. She gets a real clue to this when, on a dark and stormy night, the barely mobile Ben manages to climb out of his bed and try to escape the place through a second-story window.
Under most circumstances, this is the point where outside help would and probably should be called in, but Kruger and director Iain Softley do their best to convince us that Caroline, who has long regretted being absent when her estranged father died, would take it upon herself to get to the bottom of Ben’s trauma. It’s clear from a fairly early point that it’s tied in with a mysterious room in the attic that Violet warns Caroline against entering. She soon finds her way inside, of course, and when she discovers the many hoodoo artifacts inside, she starts down the path to believing in its power—and thus becoming susceptible to it.
The Skeleton Key begins with an effectively realistic yet atmosphere-drenched veneer and attention to detail, and the buildup generates a modest amount of tension. Like many mainstream directors taking a dip in the horror pool, though, Softley relies too much on tried-and-true tricks to create scares: characters suddenly popping into frame, loud musical stings and odd-looking folks lurking around the fringes, including the de rigueur elderly woman with blank, sightless eyes who knows the secrets of that old black magic. The movie doesn’t commingle the heroine’s personal troubles and supernatural travails with the skill or depth of this summer’s underrated Dark Water, nor is Hudson’s character, in and of herself, as interesting as Jennifer Connelly’s in that film. Rowlands provides some bite as the Southern matriarch fiercely guarding her home and her secrets, but while Hurt conveys Ben’s fear well in a part that restricts his expression, it’s a thankless role for such an accomplished actor.
The Skeleton Key does get extra points for a pretty nifty twist at the conclusion, which provides the movie’s one legitimate surprise (though I should note that the friend I attended the screening with had it all figured out fairly early on). It also sends the movie out on a nicely chilly note that restores the overall story’s status quo and plays fair with the previous exposition, while also eschewing the impulse toward a happy ending. Would that more of The Skeleton Key were as daring.
