Slender Man

This latest version of the Slender Man mythology seems to be universally reviled though I don't entirely understand why. It's not great but it's simply not THAT bad.

Alike Lovecraft Slender Man seems to be one of those commonly used subject matters that always seeems to miss the mark. Filmmakers just don't seem to be able to make the most out of the fantastic material presented before them.

So yet again we see a tale of a group of young folks on the run from the Slender Man and spooky things happen. Yadayadayada.

With a decent young cast including Joey King and Annalise Basso we're presented with the glossiest and most high budget Slender Man movie yet. Sadly along with the budget comes all the usual Hollywood horror flaws, demonstrating once again how badly Hollywood have lost their way when it comes to the entire genre.

Sure it looks great, but the plot tail spins out of control by about the halfway mark and that's such a shame as up until then it was showing real potential. Hollywood need to go back to the drawing board, hire indie filmmakers to adapt material otherwise we'll just keep getting this Insidious/Conjuring tripe.

Slender Man has it's moments and the concept is pure gold, this however is more squandered potential.

The Good:

It's Slender Man!

Atmospheric

Great cast

The Bad:

Plot falls apart badly

Potential isn't met

Too many common tropes and cliches

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Slender Man mythology is fantastic but really inconsistent, no wonder they get it so wrong with adaptations

Joey King and Annalise Basso are going to be big stars

Slender Man is like Aliens (Xenomorphs), he needs keeping in the shadows or he looks a bit silly

This should have been called The Ring: Slender Man

This movie is absolute crap. do not waste your money on this movie. Being into creepy pastas I wanted to check this out. Saying, oh it looked cool. So we sat down and just watched it. Seconds in, it was terrible acting. And even further into the movie, I didnt understand what was going on, even though my eyes were glued to the screen the whole time. The jumpscares are terrible and not even scary. all I wanted to do was leave since the first girl dissapeared. Do not waste money on this. I repeat, do not!

This movie was horrible . Longest hr & half of my life. It kept dragging and relied on not so scary jump scares. I was impressed with how much the trailer made the movie look scary and good but of course it was the wonders of cutting room floor editing. Plus most scenes in the trailer aren't in the movie!!!!

From the moment you see the trailer you know what type of movie it's going to be. It's not supposed to be a deep drama that leaves you thinking about life.

This movie does its job just fine for the genre it is! Like many others, like countdown, truth or dare, where the cast might have been a tad stronger they are all similar; it's an entity where ultimately they can't defeat.

It has its cliches, sure and it works. The movie didn't really lied to you where you have to give it a 1 or 2 because you feel cheated. It's stripped bare and delivers on what it promises. Does not deserve the 3.9. I've seen way worse...just today.

It's not Slenderman himself that's scary, it's the alone-in-the-dark deafening silence and dread that made the game frightening. Freddy Krueger was scary in the first Nightmare because they didn't focus on the character, but rather the psychological terror. Slenderman tries and fails to build a story around something that only needed to bring a feeling. It tried to get us involved in the lives of shallow and boring cookie-cutter horror-movie fodder characters. The horror genre needs to be left to the artistically gifted and intelligent artists. Slenderman is yet another mass produced generic label product waiting to be forgotten. Watch the trailer, it's way better than the movie. Or better yet, watch The Ritual for a better example of what Slenderman should have looked like.