lady in whiteFor my money, Lady In White is one of the best movies to watch at Halloween.  Yes, it takes place at Halloween.  It has a kid, a ghost, a murder to solve, and a killer on the loose.  It’s nostalgic, suspenseful, sometimes funny, and maybe a tad too sweet for some.  It is also a reminder, in some scenes, at how far society as advanced in the last forty-some odd years, for the good and the bad.

Frankie and his older brother live with their father and grandparents in a picture perfect town that looks nothing short of a Norman Rockwell painting.  Frankie knows the world, that life, is not always kind; his mother’s death is proof of that.  But the world outside his family has a darker current that runs just beneath the surface.

After a Halloween party at school, Frankie is tricked by classmates into going back into the coat closet.  The lock him in.  Unable to get out, Frankie decides he has to wait out the night until someone can free him the next day.  That night he witnesses the ghost of a little girl reenacting her murder.  Scared, he hides, until a dark figure arrives, strangles him, and leaves him for dead.

Frankie survives the attack, and learns that the ghost, Melissa, was one of ten children murdered over the past ten years.  He sets out to help Melissa rest in peace and to set an innocent man free who has been charged with the crimes.  His amateur investigation unearths clues that point to a startling, and unexpected, suspect.

Lady In White does look dated, I give you that one.  The special effects have not held up over the years; this was before CGI, but if you look at T2, it pales next to Transformers.  That aside, this is still a great ghost story, though charming to a fault.  It’s a straight forward, simple, tale about the complexities of life.

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