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Overrated and overhyped

Just perfect...

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It's a watchable movie with an original plot. The execution is a bit too poor for my taste, though.It should not be classed as "horror" in my opinion. It's deliberately dreary, depressing, and somewhat disturbing, but it's not really horror. This movie seems to rely on the assumption that unkempt little girls with heavy make-up, who like to draw picture, are scary. Well, they are not.The main problem, in my opinion, is the characters. They are too wooden and under-developed. We know nothing about these people, and therefore - have no desire to care for any of them. If anything, they were ALL kind of obnoxious and unlikeable.Not the worst movie I've seen. At least it's something different.

The Dark is directed by John Fawcett and adapted to screenplay by Stephen Massicotte from the novel "Sheep" written by Simon Maginn. It stars Sean Bean, Maria Bello, Richard Elfyn, Maurice Roëves, Abigail Stone, Sophie Stuckley and Caspar Harvey. Music is scored by Edmund Butt and cinematography is by Christian Sebaldt.An American mother tries to bring her family back together by taking her daughter to visit her estranged husband on the coast of Wales. However, when their daughter vanishes into the sea, the parents find all maybe not as it at first seems, especially when a similar looking girl appears on the scene.If you saw the tag line before watching the movie, as I did, you will know exactly what is going to happen in The Dark. Casting that irritant aside, though, The Dark is a frustratingly disappointing film. There was so much promise with the core premise of family detachment meeting the Welsh mythological world of Annwn, it's a beautifully photographed picture as well, but Fawcett (Ginger Snaps) and Massicotte (Ginger Snaps Back) bite off more than they can chew.Choosing to forgo the chance to craft a rural world of mythological pagan like horror (hello Wicker Man et al), the makers instead go for a dizzying collage of plot threads leading to a otherworld that's quite frankly not at all scary or atmospherically threatening. The attempt at scares are lazy and feel like they were inserted in at a later date to try and beef up the horror factor.Bean is underused and Bello never fully convinces as the mother awash with guilt; though to be fair to the actress she's not helped by the writing which isn't sure which side of the fence they want the audience to sit with her. Then to cap it all off we get a weak finale which is even more tepid if you have been unfortunate enough to have seen that damn tag line!Missed opportunities all round, a film with ideas above its station in spite of great work from photographer and music man. 5/10

Yes I give this film 8 but no I do not think that this is anywhere near John Fawcett's other films. The Boys Club and Ginger Snaps are films of which I have seen multiple times and they are both 10/10 films, no questions asked. This is not even close despite it still being a fantastic ghost story.I read the review of Simon Maginn, the author of "Sheep" this movie was based on. He says that it is not accurate towards the book and that is the only attack point he had. He should've known that he was giving the rights to his book to a man that destroys source material and basically does his own thing - Paul WS Anderson. I think it was his "creative involvement" that brought the movie down. If the novel was as 'good' as he says it is John Fawcett would've asked him to do the screenplay. If Anderson stuck to making Resident Evil instead I think this would've been a much better film.If I was to describe this film then I would call it a cross between John Ajvide Lindqvist's book Harbour and the Spanish horror film - The Orphanage. I like the end result of that combo.I will also say that a few things out of this film disturbed me. For example the people basically leaping to their death and they looked like they were willing to jump off this huge cliff. Another thing is that a child gets tortured.The scares in this film were atmospheric but unfortunately the SFX guy added in bumps, doors creaking etc. He did every cliché in the book. Otherwise I actually enjoyed this film. Name any other aspect - cinematography, acting, plot - and I will praise it.I will say that overall this was actually a highly entertaining horror film but as a whole it could've been better. Especially when Fawcett has made 2 other films that made my top 5 films of all time.

The Dark.I'm not usually a fan of this type of movie, preferring romantic comedies and character-based movies, but it really is a faultless piece. The cinematography and art direction are subtle but remarkably beautiful, with alchemical hues and some noir-ish moments reminiscent of Nostalgia. There are moments of homage – Don't Look Now, for example, with the child in red. Scare-mares I can usually forgo but this film takes the viewer on a loop-within-loop journey that is intriguing and whirls, dervishly with the mind. The cast are sterling stuff, too. A big shout to Christian Sebaldt, the cinematographer, to John Fawcett the director and to Stephen Massicotte and Simon Maginn the two screenwriters. Scary daughters……….or in this case scary ghost-daughters of rugged-coastline sheepfarmers, are another familiar element, but there is nothing predictable about this state-of-the-art thriller/horror/shocker. Maybe I'm coming around to becoming a fan of this genre………..gonna put some cocoa on now and listen to a friendly album.