Review: Chilean horror film La Casa delivers terror in real-time

The haunted house story is one of the most overused tropes in horror, but Chilean filmmaker Jorge Olguín has injected some real-life terrors into La Casa, an unflinching new horror film that unfolds almost entirely in real-time.

Set in Chile during 1986 when the country was still under the violent watch of dictator Augusto Pinochet, La Casa begins with police officer Arriagada (Gabriel Cañas) ordered to check on a potential disturbance at Casa Dubois, a large abandoned building in Quinta Normal, Santiago. Cañas quickly witnesses a strange apparition by the front gate and proceeds to venture into the grounds, where he is thrown into a horrific and bloody world of violent ghosts that also hold a secret about his own transgressions.

La Casa was written, directed, and produced by Jorge Olguín, who also handled the sound design and the film’s thumping electronic score. That singular vision, and the fact that the film was shot in chronological order over just three days, lends La Casa the feeling of a truly found object, something most found-footage horror films aim for, but rarely achieve.

As the only character we spend any time with in the film, Gabriel Cañas does a great job of selling Arriagada’s increasing fear as he moves deeper into the sprawling house and encounters its jump-scare ghosts that seem dead set on not letting him leave alive. La Casa goes into some incredibly dark territory in its final scenes, and Cañas is riveting in those moments that manage to bring together the horrific crimes committed under Pinochet’s rule with the unfolding haunted house storyline in an incredibly upsetting way.

La Casa is not necessarily a fun Friday night popcorn horror flick, but it offers up some genuine scares and places the action within a space and time that may be unfamiliar to many audiences. We don’t see many horror films coming out of Chile, which makes La Casa an exciting portal into the world of Latin American genre cinema. Just be sure you’re ready for what awaits you in La Casa — it may not be pleasant, but remember, when done right, horror is meant to shine a light into the very darkest of places.

La Casa is available to rent or own on VOD now and will be available on Blu-ray on February 2, 2021.