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Things Heard And Seen: It’s the winter of 1980, the best music of the decade has yet to be heard, and George spots some blood appearing on his car windscreen…
Head back nine months to the spring of that year, and George Claire (James Norton) is a painter-turned-writer who takes a job as a lecturer, teaching the only students never to mock a man for having a girl’s name, making you want to giggle every time someone calls him “Claire“.
He’s just moved into a large house in a small town, a million miles away from civilisation, with wife Catherine (Amanda Seyfried – Mank) and daughter Franny (Ana Sophia Heger), the film having a feel of a mid-70s thriller before immense tedium starts to set in.
As we see from very early on, this is a series of endless jump scares. That’s never good.
You can also tell exactly when something mysterious is about to happen as well. For example, hubby goes to put daughter to bed, leaving wifey alone in the kitchen, there’s no audio… Cue something weird about to happen, as she finds a Holy Bible with weird writing in, detailing names and dates of birth, but one, in 1877, just has a particular name replaced with the word “Damned“. Woooooooh!
Oh, and then she finds a weird ring in the kitchen, and feels an eerie presence. Zzzz….
Although Ms Seyfried is the bigger star, Norton seems to be in this more often, and before long, George meets Willis (Natalia Dyer), a cute student in the library – and suddenly starts thinking with his dick, but then she clearly feels the same way. It’s so ‘plot by numbers’, especially with the time they’ve both just done the business, yet are fully clothed from the waist up. Huh?!
Throw in siblings The Vayle brothers, who used to live in their house where some bad stuff went down, then the film starts trying to be The Shining when daughter Franny… well, starts seeing a load of weird shit and talks in weird tones like Danny Torrence. And then Cath is seeing even more weird shit.
There’s things that go bump in the night, a seance, people hiding secrets from each other, a body count that starts piling up… It’s just a mish-mash of ideas, none of which relate to each other – nor gel with each other, and all similar to anything that’s ever gone before.
However, it’s amusing how it cuts from showing George having a wank in the shower, to a shot of a waterfall, as spring turns to autumn (or ‘fall’).
Things Heard And Seen… shouldn’t, in either case.
Things Heard And Seen is on Netflix now, but isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
Check out the trailer below:
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 120 minutes
Release date: April 29th 2021
Studio: Netflix
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 (ARRIRAW (4.5K))
Rating: 0.5/10
Directors: Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini
Producers: Stefanie Azpiazu, Anthony Bregman, Julie Cohen, Peter Cron
Screenplay: Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini
Novel: Elizabeth Brundage (“All Things Cease To Appear”)
Music: Peter Raeburn
Cast:
Catherine Claire: Amanda Seyfried
George Claire: James Norton
Franny Claire: Ana Sophia Heger
Peg: Charlotte Maier
Willis: Natalia Dyer
Audrey Claire: Kristin Griffith
Eddie Vayle: Alex Neustaedter
Cole Vayle: Jack Gore
Justine: Rhea Seehorn
Tom Claire: Cotter Smith
Pat: Dan Daily
Mare Laughton: Karen Allen
Floyd DeBeers: F Murray Abraham
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.