There's Something Wrong with the Children

Horror movies in general lack a lot these days. Whether it be a sense of originality, good acting, or genuine spook factor... but it's been a while since I've encountered a movie that lacks this...

There is almost no semblance of a story here. Sure, they gave us a vague background on the characters and it gives us spooky snippets here and there, but... what exactly was the story? What was the plot here? As previously stated, you guessed it... there wasn't one. It kind of blows my mind that this could fully go into production and distributed with such a lack of storytelling. It felt super lazy like someone came up with a proof of concept but had no will or desire to elaborate on anything.

Now, with that being said, it was still a generally entertaining movie. I was intrigued throughout, it just didn't bring me anywhere. I think that said partial success mostly has to do with the acting. I thought the ensemble of the four adults did an excellent job and provided down to earth and relatable performances in a way that I feel like I haven't seen much of. They have a group argument moment at one point and it was *chefs kiss*.

At the end of the day they just wasted some solid potential with lazy storytelling, landing the movie at solidly mediocre. Also a side note, idk what they were doing with the score/sound design... but it wasn't successful... 4.5 rounding up to a 5. As far as the recommendation goes, I'm indifferent.

This movie (like so many others) had so much potential. The first half of the movie is excellent. It introduces us to our characters and develops them really well.

The premise - although not original - creates some fantastic suspense. The main character Ben knows something is up or rather WRONG with the kids, but nobody else can see it. That was so well done and allowed for some really inventive suspenseful moments.

Then the writers went and threw it all away with rushing into a third act full of the usual horror tropes. The ending was a huge let down.

Imagine if in The Shining we didn't see much of the build up of Jack beginning to lose his sanity, and instead it rushed straight to him trying to kill his family with an axe. That's kind of like what this film does, which is a shame.

I gave this film a 6/10 because I enjoyed the first half a lot. But with better writing and allowing the suspense to continue, this could have been so much better.

Of a blumhouse production this was. Its 2 families going on cabin trip, something is wrong with the kids of one of the couples, its all blurred into some building ruins in the woods that has an endless pit that hypnotize the children, and that screws around with their uncles mental health, that hallucinates and dives into paranoia at any given time...

there are loads of signs and hints to this horror mystery tail, among those are lithium , noseblood and bombdiving and a secret tunnel between the ruins and the huts. Its not much originality in the plot, the rush of scare is forced ahead by the score, more than the acting efforts. They use long stocks of ''one take'' shoots, so its well planned and panned out , but it is not enough.

The script is a real downer, and it ruins the trip for the senior horror geeks, suits better a sofa-tv fanatic with its silky touch. So its just a 5 from the grumpy old man.

Okay but why ? When the movie started I was like okay this looks kind of interesting but as the film progressed and then ended it left me with so many questions that I couldn't even enjoyed what I saw... The atmosphere was missing here and many things seemed not to connect with each other... I would have liked the film to end somewhere interesting and not just end without any explanation this shows the lack of inspiration and the dryness of their work. It could have been interesting if they had worked on it more or if they had a bigger budget.

I would love it if there was a sequel to explain what happened.

I wouldn't call this a bad movie overall. The acting, direction and cinematography are all fine, but I just found the film painful to watch.

The biggest issue for me is that the protagonists just make the wrong - and often stupid - choices at every possible opportunity. Even when the plot suggests a character has done the right thing, common sense dictates that they could have made a smarter choice.

This is especially obvious in the later half if the movie, when even characters who seem to have figured out what is happening do things that make no sense to anyone who isn't following a script.

I just found the entire movie to be a frustrating, shout-at-the-screen experience that ruined the potential enjoyment of some of the ideas the film had to play with.

Ultimately, I want a horror film to make me feel tense and anxious, not angry and frustrated.