The Innkeepers
Magnet Releasing | Release Date: February 3, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
64
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 26 Critic Reviews
Positive:
17
Mixed:
7
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
Slant MagazineJesse CataldoJan 30, 2012
Winding up the tension to an almost stubborn degree, Ti West forestalls the inevitable disappointment of its release, a blow that's further softened by how immaculately the whole movie is shot. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubAlison WillmoreFeb 1, 2012
The two amateur ghost-hunters hope to document evidence of the spirit of Madeline O'Malley in their last days of employment, though they get far more than they bargained for when she starts actually showing up. Read full review
83
IndieWireEric KohnJan 29, 2012
West, who demonstrated a penchant for extensive build-ups in "The House of the Devil" and "Trigger Man," continually makes it unclear if the inn actually harbors a ghost or if his heroine (Sara Paxton) has simply imagines it. Both she and her hilariously frazzled co-worker (Pat Healy of "Great World of Sound") want to believe in supernatural affairs for the thrill factor alone. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumJan 25, 2012
Wide-eyed Sara Paxton and hipster-bespectacled Pat Healy play the joint's only two employees, working each other into a lather of what turns out to be well-founded hysteria. Kelly McGillis is a surprise treat as a grouchy medium. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovFeb 2, 2012
What makes The Innkeepers such an unnerving experience isn't the outright horror but rather the lack of it. West mines every single floorboard creek and shadowy corridor for maximum frisson; this film ventures far beyond creepy and into the rarely explored land of genuine, incremental fear. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliFeb 2, 2012
Rarely are the characters as well developed and believable as they are here. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsFeb 2, 2012
Will The Innkeepers be enough for the young folk? These days there's little middle ground between the determined lack of gore in the "Paranormal Activity" franchise and the determined overabundance offered by so much else. West works in that No Man's Land, intelligently. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertFeb 1, 2012
Ghost movies like this, depending on imagination and craft, are much more entertaining than movies that scare you by throwing a cat at the camera. Read full review
70
NPRJeannette CatsoulisFeb 6, 2012
West's throwback style and disdain for excess allows his characters to shine. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzFeb 2, 2012
It works, both as a character study and a BOO! made-you-jump exercise in horror. Read full review
70
MovielineMichelle OrangeFeb 1, 2012
Without a strong story to dance with, all of those fabulous tracking shots, lovingly uncanny art direction details and flickering shafts of light can make The Innkeepers feel more like an exercise in craft than a scary movie. Read full review
70
Village VoiceNick PinkertonJan 31, 2012
It's this youthful denial of vulnerability that makes West's slow-sidling haunted-house movies work. He understands the kidding way that his audience approaches horror and seems to play along with that jokey imperviousness - until rudely tearing up the all-in-good-fun contract, gouging us with actual pain. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeJan 29, 2012
The result is a largely entertaining picture with too few (and late-arriving) scares to satisfy the multiplex crowd, but one that will please many die-hard genre aficionados. Read full review
70
VarietyJoe LeydonJan 29, 2012
Slow-burning buildup, lack of explicit mayhem and overall low-tech approach may strike cineastes as amusingly quaint. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinJan 28, 2012
A poky but blood-freezing throwback to the gothic horror films of the seventies, when ingénues moved tremulously down dark corridors without holding digital video cameras. Read full review
63
New York PostSara StewartFeb 3, 2012
The Innkeepers is no masterpiece, but you may well leave with your nerves expertly jangled. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaFeb 2, 2012
The humor and chops are there, but the story isn't quite. Read full review
60
TimeMary PolsFeb 9, 2012
I wanted very much for West's new movie to evoke films like "The Others" or "The Orphanage," which made me, in the moment at least, a believer in ghosts. The Innkeeper's payoff lacked that kind of oomph, and weirdly, the pairing of Luke and Claire brought movies about work relationships, like "Clerks" and "Office Space," more to mind than ghost stories. Read full review
60
The New York TimesA.O. ScottFeb 2, 2012
Luke and Claire are guilty, above all, of being dumb and bored. Even their interest in the ghost that may dwell in the dark corners of the Pedlar seems tepid and lacking in conviction. The movie, clever and rigorous though it is, feels that way too. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesFeb 2, 2012
Passably creepy chiller. Read full review
60
Time OutJoshua RothkopfJan 31, 2012
West holds your interest with material that should feel like a rip-off of The Shining. If this is mere placeholding until something more ambitious comes along for the rising director, it'll do. Read full review
50
Washington PostJohn DeForeFeb 2, 2012
It's not going to shake up the fright-flick world one bit, but The Innkeepers may earn affection from genre-lovers whose memory reaches back to before "The Blair Witch Project." Read full review
50
ObserverRex ReedJan 31, 2012
The Innkeepers, a desultory indie-prod poorly written and lamely directed by Ti West, and filmed on the cheap at the actual location, is a poor-man's rip-off of Stanley Kubrick's hotel spookfest, "The Shining," promising paranormal horrors to all who dare to enter. Where is Jack Nicholson when we need him? Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanFeb 2, 2012
A well-shot but generically dull disappointment. Read full review
38
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)James AdamsFeb 2, 2012
Admittedly, it's been a long time since Kelly McGillis was being hyped as "the next Grace Kelly." But of all the films in all the world for whom the former Top Gun lust object could have done a walk-on, this lacklustre haunted-house feature is the one she chooses? Read full review
38
Boston GlobeWesley MorrisFeb 2, 2012
For too long, this movie asks us to be interested in something that rarely in the history of the service industry has been sustainably entertaining: how dull certain jobs can be. Read full review
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