Don't Be Afraid of the Dark Review

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark Review
By Matt Recker

Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark is quite possibly the most aptly named movie to come to theaters in recent memory. Not only was it very easy to not be afraid, but it was very very dark.

Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (which will henceforth be known as D’BAD) is about a young girl named Sally who comes from L.A. to live with her father in the Adam’s Family’s house and soon find out there are tiny little monsters living inside the basement who want to kill her and eat her teeth. It stars Guy Pierce, Katie Holmes and Bailee Madison, and while none of the performances were bad, none of them really stood out either. Twelve-year-old Bailee Madison is pretty good as Sally, performing well above what is commonly expected from a child actor. The acting is competent, but does nothing to add to the quality of the picture.

Ok

D’BAD is a movie that takes absolutely no risks. The plot is fairly simple and straight forward, there is no twist ending or big reveal and all of the events play out exactly as you would expect them to. It’s safe to say that if you’ve seen more than a handful of horror movies in your lifetime, you’ve seen this movie before. Every scene feels like it was borrowed from some other below average horror flick, there is nothing unique or interesting at all on screen here and by the end it makes you feel tired and bored, at least it did to me.

As far as visuals go, if there is anything to see on screen worth noting the movie is so dark I could not see it. The creature designs look alright, and it’s really nice to see monsters return to the big screen in theaters dominated mainly by ghosts and aliens, and I thought they looked fairly unique but there are only a couple moments where you can get a decent look at them. For the most part, this is intentional to build suspense and fear but even in the scenes where you’re supposed to be able to see them it’s difficult due to the films extremely dark tone. The house itself looks good, which is a good thing since the entire movie takes place there, and the scenes in the creepy basement are for the most part… well, creepy. The movie never dares to do anything different visually, instead it settles into a cozy little corner of cinematic cliché where there is no fear of taking a chance and failing.

Do yourself a favor and watch this instead

There are also a lot of times when the characters in the movie behave like complete idiots, or seemingly important points are completely glossed over. In one scene, Sally is attacked by hundreds of the monsters in the library of her mansion during a party, and manages to actually kill one of the creatures just before her father and his guests burst in the room. Her dad rushes in to comfort her and then the scene ends. Sally doesn’t think to show the dead monster to her dad to finally prove that they’re real? Even if her dad did believe her at that point, wouldn’t it be an important plot point for him to actually see one of the creatures that has been terrorizing his daughter? I guess not, because despite deliberately showing her kill one of the things it is never shown or mentioned again. Another thing that bugged me is that the creatures are afraid of light (real original) but everyone in the movie, including the girl, insists on keeping the lights off at all hours of the day, and only doing anything at night. I understand that if they kept the place lit up like Vegas 24/7 then the monsters wouldn’t get any screen time, but do they have to practically invite them to ruin their lives. Even when the entire family finally realizes that the house is swarming with demons that want to eat their daughter and kill her stepmom, they decide to stay in the house just one more night, then leave in the morning. Yeah, that makes sense. Also, I’m not going to spoil the ending, but it makes absolutely no sense either. Characters are attacked for no reason, the monsters purpose is explained but their actions make no sense in regard to their overall goal, plot points are glossed over or forgotten about completely, it’s really just a mess. The whole film suffers from the classic horror movie syndrome where the characters act completely illogically so that the evil force can prevail, despite its incompetence.

Bottom line, D’BAD isn’t completely offensive to the senses. It isn’t the worst thing I’ve seen in theaters, not even close, but it’s just not that interesting, scary or original in any way. I’m hard pressed to find any redeeming value in it other than the fact that it wasn’t horribly painful to see. It’s a movie that has no reason to exist, and is destined to lie forgotten in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart in a years time.