Halloween Films: Part 2 (5 of 7). Henry makes the fatal mistake of reading a book for Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (currently available via Netflix). Get the full show now @ FilmBuds.Bandcamp.com!
[00:00:00] 237, let's get to Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, which came out in 2019.
[00:00:10] It's directed by Andre Ovidal, who most recently did The Last Voyage of the Demeter, which I reviewed a couple months ago.
[00:00:19] It stars Zoe Colletti, Michael Garza, Gabriel Rush, Austin Abrams, and the synopsis is Pennsylvania 1968.
[00:00:32] After playing a joke on a school bully, Stella and her friends decide to sneak into a haunted house that once belonged to the powerful Bellows family, unleashing dark forces that would be unable to control.
[00:00:47] So I saw this one in theaters. This was only my second time watching it. I hadn't watched it since then.
[00:00:56] It is based off a collection of short stories, so in a way it's an anthology film, although not really.
[00:01:04] At the same time, because all the stories are woven into one narrative, instead of it being, alright, here's one story, here's another.
[00:01:12] It's all fairly seamless in how they did that, which is well done.
[00:01:18] Both times I've watched it, it's about at the same level.
[00:01:22] I always want to like it more.
[00:01:25] It's very Stephen King, so if you like Stephen King, it's worth a look.
[00:01:30] When it comes to the main narrative, while yes, the monsters, the creatures are all very good, both the design, the practical effects, the special effects, it all looks really good.
[00:01:47] It's just that everything else in the movie really drags.
[00:01:53] And it's too bad that it had just come out a couple years before, because the group of kids in this compared to the group in it, there's like no comparison.
[00:02:07] No one in this is interesting. The performances are fine, but the writing gives them nothing to do.
[00:02:13] There's so little personality to any of them. They're not really funny. They're not really that relatable, more so than a lot of others I see.
[00:02:24] So whenever it cuts away from the horror sequences, and it's just them trying to figure out what's going on and talking to each other and all that, it really comes to a halt.
[00:02:37] I don't know if that's a direction issue, a script issue or combination.
[00:02:42] Andre, I'm sorry if I'm saying the name wrong, but Andre Avridal, I did like The Last Voyage of the Demeter.
[00:02:50] I thought Trollhunter was alright.
[00:02:53] So he's definitely an interesting fantasy horror filmmaker, but now having seen his most recent three or four at least, there's always something that feels underwhelming that doesn't go to its full potential that maybe another filmmaker could elevate.
[00:03:10] Another issue that I only realized this time, the conflict in the movie is very unengaging.
[00:03:22] As opposed to again, something like It where the movie is resolved by the kids gaining confidence, gaining courage and standing up against Pennywise, against their greatest fears.
[00:03:35] In this, it's basically just the book is writing itself, it's writing these stories for the kids to capture them or kill them.
[00:03:46] Oh no, let's run.
[00:03:48] Oh no, it's doing it again.
[00:03:50] Let's get out of here.
[00:03:51] We have to save this person.
[00:03:54] That drive to try and figure it out feels so throwaway or really non-existent for most of the movie.
[00:04:03] So I don't really care about them finding out what's happening or the end goal.
[00:04:11] However, I like the old woman who absorbs the guy in the school or the hospital, whatever that is, and then the spider bite on the girl's cheek and all the spiders crawl out.
[00:04:29] The scarecrow one, it's okay.
[00:04:31] I'd say fairly generic.
[00:04:35] There's also the corpse that's been cut apart or pulled apart and he fits himself back together in the police station.
[00:04:45] Besides that, the score is good.
[00:04:47] I think it looks fairly decent overall.
[00:04:52] I know that they're making a second one.
[00:04:54] I'll be curious to see what they do with that because you know, this is the kind of story or collection of stories that you could do whatever you want with.
[00:05:05] So that one is a heavy two and a half out of five.