The Awakening begins in 1920s London, where accomplished author and paranormal investigator Florence Cathcart spends much of her time outing charlatans and debunking spooky stories. She’s an educated lady with no time for anyone’s malarkey, and she has received plenty of flak for her no-nonsense approach to her profession. She carries on in the face of such vitriol nonetheless, and when she is referred to as a ghost hunter, she replies, “You can’t hunt what doesn’t exist.” Just underneath the surface, however, is a little hope that her assertions are not true.

Soon after she reveals an over-the-top séance as a hoax, handsome war veteran Robert Mallory arrives at her doorstep and requests her presence at a boarding school purported to be haunted by the spirit of a murdered boy. A student has just died shortly after seeing the spirit, and a real danger exists. It is the urgency of the situation that compels Florence into reluctantly accepting the invitation.

When she arrives, she finds the enormous school, which was previously an opulent private residence, teeming with mischievous boys who she believes are likely the cause of the apparent sightings. She meets Maud, the older caretaker of the premises, and Tom, a student who takes a liking to Florence and spends much of his time under Maud’s supervision. Robert, Maud, and Tom help Florence understand the school’s layout, history, and current operation. She also observes a class and hears from a frightened student who explains that he saw the ghost boy, who had an expression of pain on his face, and urged Florence to help them, to “kill it.”

Florence’s investigation begins easily enough; she sets up old fashioned traps and gizmos and other methods of catching any specters—or anyone acting like one. She initially suspects the boys of sneaking around in the middle of the night, but soon Florence begins to experience events with less obvious explanations. In one of the most chilling scenes, she catches glimpses of a boy running up the stairs. She follows and is led to a grimy, abandoned room—abandoned except for an impressive, detailed doll house. When she peers inside, she sees just how real ghosts are after all. As supernatural activity increases over the course of her investigation, memories of Florence’s own troubled past begin to bubble up. She is being haunted inside and out, and she feels the world around her unraveling, her sense of reality spiraling away. Her situation becomes desperate as she tries to uncover the secrets of the menacing halls and of her own consciousness.

The performances by the leads are right on target. As Florence, Rebecca Hall is smart and savvy. She is confident and borderline cocky early on, but as the film progresses and Florence’s cracks begin to show, Hall keeps you right there with her, hoping for her, fearing for her. As Robert, Dominic West plays the perfect tones of melancholy. He’s a man haunted by his wartime past, and his internal pain hangs heavily across his face in every scene. Imelda Staunton and Isaac Hempstead Wright round it out as Maud and Tom, and their performances are filled with compassion and suspicion—you’re never quite sure of their motivations in any given scene.

The Awakening is an engaging slow burn of a film. The time period is a refreshing setting for a ghost story. It’s a pleasure seeing Florence set up her old-timey gadgets, a welcome change from watching someone strap video cameras all over the place or hold up their smartphone to try to catch ghosts. It’s a different era without our modern conveniences, and it’s an era where everyone is inclined to believe in a spiritual world. In addition to its excellent setting, the film splendidly examines what haunts people from the inside and the outside. The external haunting triggers something buried deeply inside of Florence, and she must fight to keep her senses and come to terms with it all. The Awakening is a haunted house story with true soul.

The Awakening is currently streaming on Netflix and Amazon, and is available to purchase on DVD and Blu-ray from Amazon here.  Watch the trailer below. [youtube id=”iB8UAuGBJGM” align=”center” mode=”normal” autoplay=”no”]