Child Eater

I think this film has a lot of average things going on, including the acting. And it's cool that the police referenced the urban myth as a weird case, but I feel that there should have been more details given to the lore they were planning.

The creature almost didn't know what it wanted to be, and looked very much like a budget Jeepers Creepers. I think adding more lore/myth and information about the creature would have help make it it's own thing more.

It's not a bad watch, just very average horror.

Violence against children is one of cinema's greatest taboos, and in an age where audiences are completely jaded, and almost anything goes, it's a taboo that still remains rarely broken. Other than the death of animals, there's not much that will offend a viewership more than hurting a child. Only a sick individual would want to see something so awful on screen, and with that in mind, I approached Child Eater with great anticipation.

Based on a short (which was successfully funded via kickstarter), Erlingur Thoroddsen's Child Eater is a supernatural slasher that recalls childhood fears brought on by legends, ghost stories, and monsters that lurk inside the minds of the pre-pubescent. Thoroddsen (I won't pretend to know how to pronounce his name) brings a Finnish perspective, which isn't exactly discernible in the filmmaking, but more evident in the Scandinavian folklore-esque nature of the villain.

The story revolves around newly pregnant Helen - daughter of the town Sheriff - who is tasked with babysitting Lucas - a precocious boy living in a house with a horrible history. Lucas swears someone is watching him, first from across the forest, and soon, from his bedroom closet. Things get stranger when a local woman, once attacked by an infamous child killer, calls the Sheriff's department and claims her assailant is back and ready to kill again.

Strangely, this is the second film in a row that I've watched featuring a protagonist named Helen, and here she's played by Cait Bliss, who has a refreshing girl-next-door quality. Colin Critchley gives a rare decent child performance in amongst what, for the most part, is a mixed bag of acting.

The fall atmosphere is palpable, as the opening scenes of the film are dressed with dead trees and dry, broken grass. The villain is suitably creepy and mysterious, until we see a bit too much of him. Unfortunately, the cracks in the production begin to show through. The low budget holds it back. Some more layers of post-production may have helped with the look and sound, but that obviously wasn't an option.

Beyond the budget restrictions, all slasher films run the risk of hitting a creative wall, since there's only so much you can do with the genre. Child Eater falls into the trap and devolves into people running aimlessly through a dark forest while making increasingly poor and irresponsible decisions. The cop characters are predictably useless, and before long it becomes hard to sympathize with anyone on screen. The kills are lackluster and the stakes never feel quite high enough.

Our heroine's transition from babysitter to hardcore badass who doesn't feel pain isn't really convincing either. Her arc doesn't gel with the rest of the story. I guess there's an attempt here to say something about the anxiety of incoming parenthood, but how that relates to the villain's backstory and the rest of the characters doesn't really become apparent.

I haven't seen the short Child Eater is based on, so I can't speak to how effective the transition was to full length, but as a feature it's admirable when taking its budget into account, even if it's wonky overall. You can feel there was passion here and a genuine attempt to make something fun.

But with all that in mind I have one major complaint, and it's about the name of the film - it's false advertisement! The villain spends far more time eating adults than it does children, and for that, I can't forgive it.

Sure, it's not the best acting or the highest budget, but this was creepy. My husband asked me if I saw the figure when the closet door opened, and I had to rewind it--still didn't see it. Just the door opening on it's own made me regress to being six years old and terrified of my closet. lol It's definitely a good watch for fall or around Halloween. Watch it in the dark.

"Child Eater" is a more than admirable attempt to revive a specific type of sub-genre, namely films that are probably best described as "boogeyman horror". Movies that bring to life eerie monsters that were initially invented to petrify little children, but then turn out to be frightfully real for kids and adults! In this context, I spontaneously think of semi-classics like "Jeepers Creepers", "The Gate", "Troll", "Monster in the Closet" or "The Boogens", but "Child Eater" is actually a lot darker and more sinister than those. The tone, atmosphere and evil nature of the boogeyman here is more reminiscent to "Candyman" or the original "Nightmare on Elm Street". Mind you, I'm not saying the overall film is as good as those classics, but merely that the titular monstrosity is truly nightmarish and his background story is ultimately morbid. Writer/director Erlingur Thoroddsen – I think we better keep an eye on him – makes it clear straight from the beginning that the tale he wishes to tell is dead serious. During the atmospheric opening sequences, the camera follows around a blond little girl who wanders around all alone in the woods. Only when a person approaches her to offer help, she turns around and we learn that the poor kid is holding her own eyeball in her hand. Don't know about you, but this is definitely one of the spookiest yet most attention-grabbing intros I've seen in quite a long time! 25 years later, the same area is still under the spell of the notorious child murderer Robert Bowery. He used to be a friendly petting zoo owner, but a dreadful disease caused him to go slowly blind … and utterly mad. Bowery became convinced that he wouldn't go blind for as long as he murdered young children and ATE their eyes. But that was a long time ago. Bowery was killed, his story became an urban legend and only occasionally there are still reports of a mysterious figure dwelling around in the woods. When 7-year-old Lucas comes to warn his babysitter Helen that there's a monster in his closet, she sends him away because she has more serious problems on her mind. But then Lucas vanishes into the night. As Helen goes further and deeper into the woods to look for him, she begins to realize that the monstrous killer is back. I really enjoyed "Child Eater" a lot. It's definitely not the most original horror story, but it benefices tremendously from the desolate ambiance, grim set-pieces and the menacing titular monster. Bowery is a tall creep with thick dark glasses, ginormous ears, rotting teeth and a constant petrifying grin on his face. He actually looks a lot like Michael Berryman... Thoroddson doesn't waste any energy on unnecessary humor and there's plenty of room for gore and bloodshed next to the eerie suspense. The acting performances are adequate enough and although there are some minor flaws, "Child Eater" is an impressive long-feature debut.

Was drawn into seeing 'Child Eater' with a cool poster/cover, a very intriguing if not creative premise and as someone with a general appreciation for the genre as said many times. That it was low-budget, which from frequent personal experience is rarely a good sign due to that there are so many poor ones out there, made me though apprehensive.

'Child Eater' is a film it doesn't do enough with its potential (although there are far bigger wastes of potential in film) and could have been much better. 'Child Eater' is very weak with a lot of big problems. It certainly could have been far worse, considering the large number of films seen recently being mediocre at best and terrible at worst.

Lets start with the positives. The setting is atmospheric and spooky and 'Child Eater' could have looked far worse visually, was expecting a cheap looking film and to me that wasn't the case here.

'Child Eater' has some suspenseful and creepy moments in the first third and it started off on a fun and intriguing note.

Albeit, there is nothing new here, it's all familiar territory and executed in old-hat fashion. The second half also takes itself far too seriously and gets incredibly idiotic, a very completely different film feel here. The creepiness dissipates completely fairly early on, with the horror, suspense and tension being nowhere near enough. Things start not making much sense and gets silly, with one of the most ludicrous and easily foreseeable endings ever. The acting is not amateurish, but it's also fairly unremarkable.

Further issues are that it was clear that it was written in haste. There is a very rushed and careless feel to the story, especially in the second half where confusion and choppiness can be found in editing and narrative, and the underdeveloped and scrappy script likewise.

Then there is some padding and aimlessness that also gives the film a dragging sensation. The characters are flimsily developed, annoying and bland, the direction lacks focus and the music and sound editing are far too intrusive and obvious.

In summary, weak. 3/10 Bethany Cox