10 Great Horror Movies Ruined By Their Twists
7. The Awakening (2011)
Calling a sceptical paranormal investigator to your ghostly scene is nothing new in horror films, although this type of setup has been particularly trendy in recent years. The Awakening takes a crack at it by sending Florence Catchcart (Rebecca Hall) to a boarding school to get to the bottom of a young student's death, as well as explain his peers subsequent supernatural sightings.
Florence quickly determines that a teacher frightened the boy, causing an asthma attack that would take his life. From there the story really begins to heat up. Among other developments, Florence forms a connection with a lonely child named Tom and starts running into some supernatural occurrences that she cannot manage to explain rationally. The movie hums along with some great scares; until the climax and conclusion, that is.
It turns out Florence grew up in that building and Tom is the ghost of her dead half-brother. This twist - that grief made a central character repress key facts - is used in a number of horror movies to pull the wool over the audience's eyes (Triangle immediately comes to mind).
For such a rational and clear-headed investigator, it's a bitter pill to swallow that Florence needs so much time and generous nudging from ghostly forces just to recognise/remember that shes a central piece of the puzzle.