There are sections in the first half of The Innkeepers where you aren't quite sure it knows what it wants to be.
It might have something to do with the ample amounts of porn in his Internet history. That's precisely what he brings to The Innkeepers, but it's never a case of actually wanting to see he and Claire get together in any capacity more than friends and coworkers. Even in smaller, trivial moments like rubbing her eyes, she's almost like a kitten you just want to pat on the head and tell her everything is going to be okay. Paxton in particular brings an endearing quality to Claire. It's cute, and the honesty Paxton and Healy bring to the characters is necessary. With nothing but each other and the Internet to entertain themselves, the two bounce back and forth between each other, playing tricks on each other and playing games like trying to ring the desk bell on the other. It plays like a comedy, almost a romantic comedy depending on your interpretation of the bond between Claire and Luke.
Of course, there's a very specific difference between The House of the Devil and The Innkeepers.
Just as in The House of the Devil, he has the path laid out before you, there's no way to take any other way, you just can't see the end from here. That's something Ti West is quickly becoming an artist at, shattering expectation, taking his audience in one direction then quickly pulling their reins to the left. Of course, things don't quite turn out the way they are expected to in the last weekend of the Yankee Pedler. With only a couple of guests to serve, the two spend their days and nights searching for proof the hotel is haunted, making EVP recordings and generally trying to creep each other out. The hotel, supposedly haunted, is seeing its last weekend of business before closing its doors for good. The titular innkeepers are Claire and Luke, played by Sara Paxton and Pat Healy, two employees of the Yankee Pedler Hotel. It's time the rest of the horror world to take notice.
But the confidence that West exudes and the total package he presents with the film may be the jarring jolt the horror industry has been looking for. Hell, it's not quite what you expect after the halfway point. It's a highly effective ghost story that may not be quite what you expect going in. That's not a figurative way of saying The Innkeepers derails. He slowly simmers, begins turning up the temperature on the pot, and then flips the entire table on its side spilling everything on the floor. Ti West likes to knock the pot roast off the table.
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