Years before their celebrated turn in the martial arts vehicle Furie, director Le-Van Kiet and star Veronica Ngo were involved in one of the first Vietnamese horror entries with their take on the haunted house style. A slow-burn effort reminiscent of the old-school classics of the genre from elsewhere in the world, this offers up plenty of spooks and thrills for the patient ones willing to look into the film.
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While they are happily settling into their new life in their spacious home, young couple Thao (Veronica Ngo) and her husband Thanh (Son Bao Tran) lose their baby to a miscarriage. After the tragedy, Thao is inconsolable and won't let her baby's body leave the house. Normal life eludes her as terrifying visions undermine her sanity. Thanh soon begins experiencing strange phenomena around their home as well, and when his wife turns on him he must race to uncover the secrets of the house in the alley before they lose their sanity and their lives.
For the most part, “House in the Alley” is a highly enjoyable ghost story. A lot of what really works well here is due to writer/director Kiet's story, which takes plenty of cues from the genre's past to tell a creepy tale. Quickly moving away from the traumatic setup about the stillborn birth and Thao's fractured mindset at losing her child, the first-half where she's quiet and reserved trying to move past it despite his sincere best attempts to help her as well as focus back on work lays an intriguing groundwork for later. With the clear and obvious aspect that she's not moved on with the way she acts around the now-abandoned nursery, dealing with her mother or Thao and Thanh's date-night creating a strain on top of his work-life, it all creates the prototypical perfect storm of loss and grief that makes one an obvious target for supernatural activity. As this occurs alongside the other storyline about Thanh's job creating undue stress on both of them, a finely-tuned psychological mindset is employed, that potentially enhances or undermines everything around them. There's enough at play here that the incidents around their house are justifiably arguable as to whether they're genuine supernatural hauntings or the result of a fractured mental state.
When the film moves away from this psychological setup, the scares created by Kiet are quite impressive. Initially starting small, with eerie ethereal children laughter heard nearby or hallucinations of blood seeping from unnatural objects, the change into much larger and more impressive scares as they spend more time in the house begins gradually increasing. Seeing the ghost of a baby pop-up in the middle of the bed between Thanh and Thao is inordinately chilling, much like the constant accidents he has that are caused by the belief that someone is in the house with them and being startled to the point of injury. The idea that Thao's become unhinged with the attempted burning of the nursery or standing outside in the rain while nude, offers up even more clues that something isn't right. The lead-in to the full reveal of what's been going on in the house leads to some incredibly thrilling scenes here. The final race to finish off the threat facing them is quite suspenseful, utilizing some creepy imagery with the ghost kids and several well-timed jump-scares to deliver a harrowing sequence that ends the film on a high note. Overall, these aspects make the film quite fun and enjoyable.
There are a few problems with “House in the Alley.” It's biggest issue is the rather slow-burn approach that doesn't provide the swiftest pacing for a genre film. Kiet ends up taking a more measured approach to the storyline that can make the film feel like a drag at points. As the first half tends to focus more on setting up Thao and Thanh's relationship problems as well as his work struggles involving the pushy mother and well-meaning brother, there's not a lot of genuine thrills here beyond a few sporadic encounters that are too brief to generate anything more than minor thrills. As the work-struggles storyline is the one that goes nowhere with Thanh being unable to come to terms with being there while wanting to stay with Thao, to the disappointment of his mother, it serves as a plot-point increasing his stress without much else. Therefore, these scenes are quite problematic stalling the pacing to get them out of the way instead of doing something more thrilling or suspenseful. The other issue here is a somewhat halfhearted finale explanation for everything that's going on, using a single conversation as a coda at the end of the film to tell what's going on. This makes it feel like a copout way of offering a reason for the hauntings.
An impressive and wholly enjoyable old-school haunted house film, “House in the Alley” offers a lot to like overall in that style which keeps the movie watchable without too many detrimental issues. Look into watching this one if you're a fan of those slow-burn haunted house films or Asian horror in general, while viewers wanting quicker paced entertainment might be the only ones turned off here.
