The House with the Clock In Its Walls 2018

     This film is adapted from a novel by John Bellairs.  In 1955, the parents of ten-year-old Lewis Barnavelt are killed in a car crash.  Lewis moves to live with his Uncle Jonathan.  The only items he has from his parents are a Magic 8-Ball they had given him and a family photo.  When Lewis arrives at the house, he meets Jonathan’s neighbor Florence Zimmerman.  She is also Jonathan’s friend but not romantically.  During his first night in the house, Lewis hears a ticking sound in the walls.  Lewis begins exploring the house and he sees Jonathan smashing a wall with an ax.  Jonathan tells Lewis that he is a warlock and Florence is a witch.  The previous owners were a sinister warlock and his wicked wife Selena.  They hid a clock within the walls of the house before they died.  Jonathan is trying to find the clock to discover its purpose.

     There is a LOT going on in this film.  Maybe what is happening is believable to some people but probably a specific age group?  Not too young and not too old, possibly pre-teen?  For others, it’s better to be doing something else at the same time as watching!!  2 ½* (This movie is so-so)

105 min, Fantasy directed by Eli Roth with Jack Black, Cate Blanchett, Owen Vaccaro, Kyle MacLachlan, Renee Elise Goldsberry, Colleen Camp, Sunny Suljic, Lorenza Izzo, Braxton Bjerken, Vanessa Anne Williams, Ricky Muse, Charles Green De’Jon Watts, Aaron Beelner, Joshua Phillips.

Note:  Imdb 6.0, Rotten Tomatoes 66% critic 45% audience, Roger Ebert 2 ½*, RollingStone 3* of 5* Peter Travers, Amazon 4.1* out of 5* with 1098 reviews, the book has 4.3* out of 5* with 293 reviews,  EmpireOnline 3* out of 5* Dan Jolin, The Guardian 2* out of 5* Peter Bradshaw, WashingtonPost 2.5* out of 4* Jane Horwitz, Metacritic 57 out of 100 with 38 critics 5.8 out of 100 with 162 reviews.

Special Note:  The fictional house was based on the real-life Cronin Mansion in author John Bellairs’ hometown of Marshall, Michigan.  This town was also the basis for the fictional town of New Zebedee used in his novels.  Filmed on Greenville Street, Newman; 1260 Briarcliff Rd NE; Atlanta Metro Studios, Union City; Champ’s Clock Shop, 3834 King Drive, Douglasville and Atlanta, Georgia.  The gross for this film was $68.5 million in the US and Canada and $62.9 million in other countries.  The total gross was $131.5 million and the budge was $42 million.