David and Dana (Mel Raido and Kate Beckinsale) move with their son Lucas into an old empty house on the outskirts of town to reboot their lives after a recent family tragedy. When Dana settles in to start renovating the old creepy place (she was A Talented Architect back in the city) she has flashes of visions of an older grim-looking man and his evil black dog, as well as a sad girl. Her discovery of a secret attic room at the top of the house (did neither of them even look at the house before buying?) completes the supernatural setting and sets us up for some intriguing conundrums: is this a sinister ghostly series of events, or are these hallucinations manifesting from Dana going off her tragedy-aftermath-prescribed meds? 

Photo Credit: Peter Iovino
Copyright: © 2014 DR Productions, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Unfortunately, The Disappointments Room never delivers on any of this in any kind of original, sincere, or cohesive way. Individual scenes are shocking or suspenseful or scary, and feel as if they could be building up to something good, and then they’re abandoned unsatisfactorily and a new scene begins that has little or not connection to the previous. A character is killed (and maybe by Dana), but is never mentioned again and nobody from town ever comes looking for him. Diminutive town historian Ms. Judith (Marcia DeRousse) actually brings up the movie Poltergeist when talking to Dana about the house, later is horrified to be looking at old newspaper clippings that detail what went on at the house years ago, and then her character is never seen again during the rest of the running time. A handsome handyman shows up unannounced to help them with repairs (luckily the town gossips told him they needed a handyman), flirts with Dana, starts looking at roof leaks–but then inexplicably the first thing he does is start digging out in the yard far away from the house (presumably because they needed a character to discover what was buried underneath).

Photo Credit: Peter Iovino
Copyright: © 2014 DR Productions, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

And that’s one of the main problems with the script (by actor Wentworth Miller): characters do things because they have to get to the next plot point, and not because the character would actually, naturally do these things in these situations.  Mel Raido tries his best as the logical sturdy husband, but he comes off as some kind of misogynistic jerk trying to cure (or at least tolerate) his wife’s hysteria. Director D. J. Caruso (Disturbia, I Am Number Four), who also wrote,  is erratic at best here. The film lurches from scene to scene without much cohesion or running thread to help us along.

Photo Credit: Peter Iovino
Copyright: © 2014 DR Productions, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

I take that back. Two things are consistent throughout The Disappointments Room. One is Duncan Joiner as the young son, Lucas. This kid was natural, believable, and sympathetic in every minute of screen time. I liked him, a lot, and I was genuinely concerned for his character’s safety and well-being throughout. Kudos to him.

The other thing that I enjoyed immensely was Rogier Stoffers’ cinematography. This movie looks gorgeous, utilizes unique angles and viewpoints (particularly in scenes involving the dizzying spiral staircase that leads up to the room) and made it that much more interesting to watch. Unfortunately, if the best thing you can say about a movie is that it looks pretty, well….  So, maybe if you turn the sound off you might enjoy it more than I? As it stands, I just can’t recommend it.