A strangely airless American horror/satanism period piece set at wintry West Point in the Hudson Valley in New York State in the 1830s (reminiscent of The Crucible and so forth). The stellar cast — Christian Bale in the lead, Timothy Spall, Toby Jones, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Gillian Anderson, and I did enjoy Robert Duvall's professor of esoteric literature and Harry Melling's Edgar Allan Poe — just can't achieve liftoff.
Jeannette Catsoulis: contrary to her, I don't think there's anything supernatural in this. Glenn Kenny: contrary to him, I don't think the final movement redeemed anything. This is not one of Bale's finer outings.