Boogeyman Movie Review:


At some point in all of our lives we have been scared of the things that live under our beds or the creatures ready to pounce on us when we open a closed closet door. Some of us have even uttered the word “boogeyman” once in a while. But have we ever been curious enough to build a horror film around the concept? Maybe if we were all age seven and never grew up.

Our imagination plays wonderful and sometimes frightening tricks on us and for nearly fifteen years, Tim Jensen (Barry Watson of WB’s 7th Heaven), has had to live with the horrific fact that the “boogeyman” is actually real and that he took his dad when Tim was just eight years old.

Emotionally wooden and paralyzed by his fears of shadows and closets, Tim has tried to put his past behind him and move on with girlfriend Jessica (Tory Mussett).

But another tragedy befalls the Jensen family bringing Tim back to the very house where he witnessed the phenomenon steal his father. Tim must reconnect with the world he so desperately wants to forget and finally face his fears.

“Boogeyman” is a horror film based on one intricate concept. If you don’t believe it won’t scare you. Not for one moment does it try to be credible or even trick us into thinking that Tim’s imagination may be in fact false. If it did and played with the idea that Tim was in fact insane it could have been a better film. But there is no psychological drama here.

There are oodles and oodles of door-knobs zooms and close-ups. There are a couple quick scans, moody atmosphere, the quintessential nearly naked co-ed, the misunderstood hero and of course the phenomenon. But there is no shred of originality in this dullard of a film. It is brain dead and just going through the motions.

Barry Watson comes from the WB stable of the “cute-&-marketable”. But it is rather interesting to see how many different expressions the actor can come up with for being frightened of a shadow or doorknob. I think I counted two and the others seemed to be a cross between constipation and frustrated boredom. Even if we had the most critically acclaimed star in this film it still wouldn’t have worked so I can’t entirely blame Watson.

Also was it just me or did Tory Mussett, Watson’s girlfriend on screen look a lot like a young Priscilla Barnes from “Three’s Company”?

My blame probably will go to the screenwriter and director who should have tried to dazzle, impress or solidify themselves as credible visionaries. Can you imagine what this film could have been if it had some psychological twists and turns and maybe even an accusation of murder.

Horror is a perfect genre to prove yourself worthy of developing bigger and better projects especially with the genre seeing a resurgence with sleeper hits like “Saw” and “The Grudge”. Horror films are cheap to make and easy to market so why not run with it. I guess I just wish they would have upped the ante some.

There were some interesting things in the film’s third act but really nothing worth waiting around for. I liked some of aspects of third act but I still can’t even recommend the film as a video rental.

As I watched “Boogeyman” all I could think about was that I wished the boogeyman would come out the shadows and take me away from this abysmal film.

So Says the Soothsayer.



Dean Kish

Billed as a terrifying exploration of human fear, you at least expect a bit of actual psychological suspense. But every jolt in this film involves crash editing and deafening noises, while nothing is made of the premise or the characters.

Tim (Watson) has managed to grow up despite his debilitating fear of darkness under beds and in closets. Having witnessed his father's violent abduction by the boogeyman (Glover), he's terrified about returning home years later for the funeral of his crazed mother (Lawless). Leaving his fed-up girlfriend (Mussett) behind, he heads home and reacquaints himself with a neighbour friend (Deschanel) and a creepy girl (Bartusiak) as his old demons come back to haunt him.

It's an understatement to say this film is over-designed. Every set has been created to look as scary as possible, which means nothing looks realistic. Which means we can't identify with the settings at all. Add to this wafer-thin characters played by attractive young actors who never get a chance to add any depth. And a script that throws out logic in lieu of horror movie cliches like women taking baths alone.

Director Kay is clearly wanting to echo Asia's creep-out thriller hits, but he forgets their less-is-more brilliance to instead pile on over-the-top set pieces, leading to a cacophonous and incomprehensible climax. Vaguely insinuating is one thing; noisily muddled is another. Instead of Nakata or Miike, he instead replicates Paul WS Anderson's mindless-jolt approach to horror. It isn't remotely scary, and keeps us jumping only because the sounds and images are so frantically edited.

That said, there are some intriguing things going on, including Tim's bizarre time/space displacement, some heavy subtext in his fear of open closets, and the gorgeous quality of the filming itself, in which everything is glaring white or blackly shadowed, with little space for shades of grey or any other colour (besides some well-placed streaks of fake blood, of course). But like the bright young cast, these details are drowned out by the chaos around them. And most unforgivable of all, it takes itself far too seriously.

Rich Cline

Fifteen years ago, Tim Jensen (Watson) was told a story about the man who lived in your closet and who get you when lights went out. Terrified to go to sleep, his dad came into show him that everything was safe, only to be taken before his very eyes. Now grown up, Tim was still gripped by fear but on hearing about the death of his mother, he realises he has to return to the house were it all started.

After starting well with the remake of ‘The Grudge’, Sam Raimi’s production company ‘Ghost House Pictures’ second picture is an original fright fest but does it have what it takes to produce some genuine scares? Definitely not!

Hopes where high when Sam Raimi started his own film company to specialise in horror but after this effort you might start thinking it is going down the same route as Robert Zemeckis’s Dark Castle Entertainment buy producing unoriginal, mundane horror movies. This is horror on its most basic level, providing the most basic scares and delivering a pay off that is extremely predictable and just plain lame.

By trying to utilise different camera techniques, quick focus, erratic movements and fast cuts, director Stephen T. Kay, wants to create as many jumps as he can but he just doesn’t have the still or vision of the current leaders in the field, Asian cinema. For a film that is supposed to be running on tension, the level is high in the beginning but then plunges to an all time low when it comes to the completely awful finale.

The main problem with the movie is the pacing. It is just far too slow and this just dissipates any tension that has been built up in the pre-credit sequence. The film plods along, offering the odd jump but as the movie builds to its inevitable climate, everything becomes far too clichéd and repetitive. How many times do we have to have Tim looking scared while looking at a closet door?

The climatic reveal of the Boogeyman himself is the biggest let down. Originality is thrown totally out of the window and, as with many Hollywood horror flicks, they do not reveal the origins or reasoning behind his actions. What drives him to torment little children? Where does he come from? How did he get his powers? These questions are unanswered and this will frustrate most horror fans.

‘Boogeyman’ is an example of Hollywood doing horror extremely badly. With no real creativity or originality, this is a like and instruction manual on what not to do. By trying to imitate the Japanese style but combining it with the traditional tinsel town monster, the filmmakers have created something that just doesn’t work and creates no tension, suspense or real horror. You’d be right in expecting more from Sam Raimi’s production company.

Jamie Kelwick

 

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