Vacancy is a schlock surprise: a no-frills motel-hell slasher film -- with a bit of soul.

For the most part, this movie hits the right notes and gives its audience a dose of white-knuckle tension.

It's a sordid but expert shocker.

Antal smartly adheres to the no-frills demands of B-movie horror, eliciting impressive chills from old-fashioned suffocating dread rather than the now usual gore. And Wilson and Beckinsale superbly execute everything that's required of their characters--namely, yelling and running.

Making an assured transition to Hollywood after his Hungarian cult sensation "Kontroll," director Nimród Antal gets his business done with an efficiency that recalls "Red Eye," another thriller that clocks in under 90 minutes. But efficiency isn't everything, and Antal sacrifices too much in order to sustain tension.