Claiming to be based on actual events is a reasonably common gimmick employed in horror. Audiences have become far too savvy now, and it’s not very effective anymore. In the digital age, where Google is always at our disposal, all it takes is a quick search to disprove a “true story” boast or come up empty altogether. Still, it’s easy to overlook a marketing ploy if the film excels at what it’s trying to accomplish or conjure up several potent scares to win us over. 32 Malasaña Street doesn’t manage either.
Despite his best efforts and some chilling moments, not even the uncanny Javier Botet can keep this haunted house horror movie from feeling stale.
Set in 1976, the narrative centers around the Olmedo family, who’ve left behind their small-town life and moved into a bargain-priced apartment in bustling Madrid. It’s a fully furnished flat complete with the dusty and cobweb-covered memories of a long-vacant home. Naturally, undisclosed in the apartment’s listing was its history with death. It’s haunted, and the menacing ghost wants something from the family. It won’t rest until it gets it.
Directed by Albert Pintó, 32 Malasaña Street falls back on the familiar tropes of haunted house fare. The Olmedo family dumped every penny they own into the mortgage, rendering them financially unable to leave. Not that they even want to, initially. Using the ’70s gender and social norms as a crutch, the first to notice something is amiss is the youngest child, an ailing and feeble-minded grandfather, and a teen daughter. The latter is the one burdened with the former two’s sole caregiver responsibilities and treated as lesser than her teen brother. Her stepfather and mother have their tumultuous relationship issues to contend with, and her teen brother is occupied by a flirtation. It sounds like the “actual events” that inspired the story might be Amityville-related from the setup.
Botet plays the central entity plaguing the family, and, as always, can be counted on to bring the terror. As a nice bonus, Botet also plays the family’s real estate agent, giving the actor a chance to step outside of eerie monster makeups for a bit. Botet’s unique physicality and adept ability to bring horrifying creatures to life continues to hold true here. Pintó crafts some excellent moments around Botet and wrings tension out of the fantastically creepy old apartment building. For the most part, though, Pintó employs all of the familiar scare tactics, rendering a number of them ineffective.
The story reveals in the third act liven up the showdown between the Olmedo family and the entity tormenting them, but more in a melodramatic Lifetime movie sort of way. Pintó might be trying lob social criticisms, but the characters and their interpersonal relationships haven’t been developed enough to make them land with any real meaning. That’s the ultimate crux of the film; sacrifices and revelations are made, but they ring hollow when none of these characters are given any depth beyond their archetypical purpose.
32 Malasaña Street offers a paint-by-numbers haunter that retreads familiar ground. It’s a thinly written story with even more frustratingly bland characters. Still, if all you’re in the mood for is a horror movie that offers a spooky atmosphere and a ghost that unnerves, Pintó and Botet deliver on that much at least.
32 Malasaña Street releases on Shudder on October 22, 2020.
