Scary Stories

It's Halloween, 1968 in the town of Mill Valley, Pennsylvania. Stella Nicholls is out with her friends Auggie Hilderbrandt and Chuck Steinberg. They are pursued by bully Tommy Milner after the friends pull a prank on him. They find sanctuary in Ramón Morales' car in the drive-in. Stella leads the group to a haunted house. They escape from scary things including Tommy's revenge. Stella takes an old book from the abandoned house. You don't read the book as much as the book reads you. It belongs to Sarah Bellows who lived a tragic life and died horribly.

It's a good in-between horror between the kiddie spooky stories and outright adult gore-fest horrors. I like all the characters. I like the teen actors. I like the spooky and slightly scary stories. I like the idea of the book and the body horrors. The zombie looks good and I expected nothing less from a Guillermo del Toro production. It is not quite an adult horror but it's a good step up from a kiddie campfire story.

To my surprise, this movie was not what I was expecting at all. From the title, I was sure I'd see a portmanteau movie of unconnected short stories, similar to 1983's "Twilight Zone: The Movie". But with a kid-centric plot and set in a small American town, the formula is similar to "It" or "Super 8". However, the episodic nature of serial "incidents" aligns it more with the style of the "Final Destination" films.

Stella Nicholls (Zoe Margaret Colletti) is a horror geek and aspiring writer living in Mill Valley, a small Pennsylvanian town during the Nixon election of 1968. Stella has a couple of friends: the requisite Scoobie Doo Shaggy character Chuck (Austin Zajur) and the 'sensible' "it's all science" character Auggie (Gabriel Rush). But pursued by local hoodlum Tommy (Austin Abrams), Stella, Chuck and Auggie are thrown together with draft-dodging outsider Ramón (Michael Garza).

They escape into the local spooky house - a house where legend has it that terrible things were done to a strange albini girl, Sarah. That legend has it that Sarah used to tell local kids scary stories through the walls. And Stella finds a book... a book that appears to be unfinished....

This is a time when horror films are either "old school" or more psychological in nature (like "Hereditary"). This one has Guillermo del Toro's hand behind that of lead-writers Dan and Kevin Hagerman. And it's firmly old-school. There are some effective (but at times comically created) spooky moments that are scary without being hugely gory. This earns it a UK15, rather than a UK18, certificate. It's disappointing that doesn't stretch to 12A to attract a younger teenage audience, since the source material is actually from a "Goosebumps"-like set of short stories by Alvin Schwartz.

The story's 'episodes' are nicely varied. At the gross-out end of the scale is an episode with Chuck's sister Ruth (Natalie Ganzhorn) that might get arachnophobes running for the exits. My personal favourite? A 'red room' episode with the oncoming fate comically arriving in slow-motion like the steam-roller in "Austin Powers"!

This is another film that relies on the quality of its young cast, with the only moderately well-know cast name being Gil Bellows as the local sheriff. In this regard, the stand-out performance is that of Zoe Margaret Colletti who does a fabulous job as Stella. She's been in a few films in the past ("Annie", "Wildlife" and "Skin") but this is her breakout performance in a starring role. She's done her CV a great favour here.

Directed by "Troll Hunter" director André Øvredal, I really enjoyed this one. I'm not a massive fan of 'slasher' style horror films. I have no burning desire to be constantly reminded of what the inside of my body looks like. So this turned out to be much-more to my liking than the normal horror flick. It had enough spookiness to make me turn on the lights when I got back home, but not enough to pervade my dreams.

The young cast perform well. They are given enough back-story and personality by the script to make you care about their fate.

So overall, this one comes with a "Recommended for wimps" (like me)!

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Film directed by André Øvredal and co-written with Guillermo del Toro, Scary Stories (2019) benefits from an efficient Halloween atmosphere, an excellent photography, the nostalgic 60's dress code, impressive old cars and rather talented young actors. On certain aspects, in particular the ineluctably-fatalistic side, the film makes me think of Les Griffes de la nuit (1984) directed by Wes Craven in which a psychopath sadistically haunts teens during their sleep.

After the showing of a cult film (La Nuit des morts-vivants (1968)) in a drive-in theater, a group of teens arrives, we do not really know how, in a time-worn mansion on the edge of town, abandoned for ages after an unexplained murder. By chance, they find a book. A cursed book! The small town will then suffer a wave of atrocious deaths. Stella and Ramón will have to face their own worst demons in order to stop the carnage and save the inhabitants.

As a synthesis: an efficient teen movie for getting started with cinematographic thrills. 6/7 of 10

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is the type of book that has most certainly made its impact. At the same time, it's also virtually impossible to adapt directly since it's a collection of short stories. While it would possibly work as an anthology horror, the movie takes a different direction and makes its own story that incorporates characters from the book's stories as villains. With horror maestro Guillermo del Toro as producer, it captures the essence of the book, which is good enough. All things considered, this is really more of an ode to horror as a genre, and to the things that scared us as kids. It incorporates several horror subgenres, which was a great addition. It has ghosts, zombies, body horror, and a monster sequence near the end. Popular characters from the book's terrifying illustrations appear, and they look fantastic. It has a great feel to it, and Del Toro's fingerprints are apparent in it. Unfortunately, it has some drawbacks. The main human cast is bland and forgettable. There's nothing here that you've never seen before. Overall, this is the type of movie that would be great if you're a kid and it's your first horror movie. However, if you were in elementary school when SSTTITD was at its peak, you'd be in your 30s at least in 2019 when this movie came out. Today's kids probably haven't heard of it (although who knows, I knew it growing up in the 00's). It ends on a sequel hook, curiously enough, so that may be on the horizon.

While this movie may have had a few of your typical horror movies moments, it is still an interesting concept. The actors all for the most part play their roles well, and the special effects and cgi are all there. I could see this film gain a cult following and maybe end up having a trilogy or even more movies. The fact that this movie doesn't have a lot of star power is another reason why I enjoyed it. I like seeing young, up and coming actors shine new light into a genre that is seldom successful at actually making a good and enjoyable film. This one gets two thumbs up from me!