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The Skeleton Key

The Skeleton Key

Drama · Horror · Mystery · 2005

A hospice nurse working at a spooky New Orleans plantation home finds herself entangled in a mystery involving the house's dark past.

Movie details

The Skeleton Key

“Fearing is believing.”

2005 Drama · Horror · Mystery 1h 44m

Critical arithmetic

One number, for now.

TMDB

6.6 / 10

Community rating

A hospice nurse working at a spooky New Orleans plantation home finds herself entangled in a mystery involving the house's dark past.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over The Skeleton Key?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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An aging, reclusive Southern belle plagued by a horrifying family secret descends into madness after the arrival of a lost relative.

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The Others

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Grace is a woman who lives in an old house kept dark because her two children, Anne and Nicholas, have a rare sensitivity to light. When the family begins to suspect the house is haunted, Grace fights to protect her children at any cost in the face of strange events and disturbing visions.

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Reminiscence

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Nicolas Bannister, a rugged and solitary veteran living in a near-future Miami flooded by rising seas, is an expert in a dangerous occupation: he offers clients the chance to relive any memory they desire. His life changes when he meets a mysterious young woman named Mae. What begins as a simple matter of lost and found becomes a passionate love affair. But when a different client's memories implicate Mae in a series of violent crimes, Bannister must delve through the dark world of the past to uncover the truth about the woman he fell for.

Stir of Echoes

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Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Iain Softley

Written by

Ehren Kruger

Kate Hudson

Kate Hudson

Caroline Ellis

Gena Rowlands

Gena Rowlands

Violet Devereaux

Peter Sarsgaard

Peter Sarsgaard

Luke Marshall

John Hurt

John Hurt

Ben Devereaux

Joy Bryant

Joy Bryant

Jill

M

Marion Zinser

Bayou Woman

Maxine Barnett

Maxine Barnett

Mama Cynthia

Court is in session

Put The Skeleton Key on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Arthouse Gremlin

“Its refusal to behave is the point.”

The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.

The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist

“Oddness is not depth.”

A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.