The Haunting of Bly Manor
netflixBilled bizarrely as a gothic romance, Mike Flanagan's long-awaited follow-up to The Haunting of Hill House is worthwhile and chilling to the bones, even if at times it can't quite escape the shadow of its superior predecessor.
The dialogue is mostly well done, but Flanagan fails to understand the etymological particularities of the English countryside setting. The British characters speak like Hollywood thinks they do rather than how they actually would; the word 'splendid' is used more times than one can count and whilst this is to an extent done to emphasise the strangeness of the children, it just doesn't gel. This can be initially alienating – particularly to British viewers – but after this frustration has been moved past, Flanagan's talent for writing dialogue is laid bare. There is more narration in Bly Manor than Hill House, however, due to an irritating and well-worn "gather round the campfire and let me tell you a story" type framing device, a trope which Flanagan has proved he is far too skillful to be needing to use.
The music, too, is deliberately similar to that of Hill House, though the exact reason remains elusive. Flanagan seems almost too eager to tie the two anthologies together. The theme music is slightly changed, but many tracks between both series are reused and, whilst the music is still fantastic, it does seem a little lame that so much of it is reused with little to no variation. The cinematography retains Flanagan's distinct style – which can be hard to pin down stylistically but is relatively easy to spot – but differentiates itself in an interesting way, slightly smudged with a soft focus. In a lesser director's hands this could look ugly, but Flanagan deftly makes it look beautiful with his signature mixture of blue and black hues as exquisite as ever.
Recast as a new bunch of characters, every single actor returning from the first season is absolutely excellent. Compounding this is the unrelentingly disquieting tone, brilliantly executed through the use of disturbing dialogue exchanges, odd goings-on that keep both the audience and characters on their toes and well timed scares, although nothing of the latter category come close to being as fantastic as some of Hill House's best.
This is partly because the imagery isn't generally as striking; there are a couple of recurring ghosts but not enough to keep the constant tension that permeated Hill House, and there is much more of a reliance on predictable jumpscares. Additionally, so much of the fear generated by Flanagan's previous series came from the complex and intertwined dynamics of the family members and the house itself. Where Bly Manor fails, in this regard, is that the horror comes simply from imagery rather than both imagery and plot as in the prior season of the anthology – it doesn't help that both of these aspects were better in Hill House either. Although the moody atmosphere is still present, there is a lack of detail and refinement which kept viewers on the edge of their toes in the first season, where one was constantly searching the frame for hidden ghosts. The emotional range of the series is subdued, too, and whilst the heights of incredible emotion Hill House managed to evoke was never likely to be replicated as fully, there isn't as much depth between the characters themselves and so the viewing experience is less emotive.
The result is that Bly Manor is to Hill House for Mike Flanagan what Midsommar is to Hereditary for Ari Aster; incredibly good at showing the director's horror sensibilities but just missing some of the themes and emotional punch that take the latter of both directors' work to the next level. For almost every scene in Bly Manor, there is a comparable one in Hill House that takes similar ideas to an elevated level and is all the more memorable for it. Not the groundbreaking doozy Hill House was but enjoyable enough nonetheless.