Teen Lisa Johnson (Abigail Breslin) is trapped in a kind of undead, unfunny “Groundhog Day,” living one particular 24 hours with her family (Peter Outerbridge, Michelle Nolden, Peter DaCunha) over and over. Breslin’s sullen, ’80s-era goth ghost feels like something out of early Tim Burton, with her baggy Siouxsie tee and eye-rolls: “I did the laundry yesterday,” she complains to her mom. “You just don’t remember.”
She’s the only one who seems to know they’re stuck — until she makes contact with someone else in the house. Gradually, she begins to unravel the secret of what happened to them and why. And that, ironically, is where this horror movie loses steam.
Director Vincenzo Natali (“Splice”) tells the story of a house cursed by a serial killer (Stephen McHattie) artfully enough, but the plot spirals into increasing fuzziness: The murderer seemingly abducted a string of girls, but randomly, whole families are dead, too. Eventually, he just seems like a really unfocused bad dead dude.