Spectre

surprising because Ulli Lommel was involved in writing directing and producing this thing.i didn't realise Lommel was behind it until i got it home.by then figured what the hey.i mean how bad could it be,right.after all,i managed to see at least some of Lommel's other travesties,B.T.K and Black Dalia.those were putrid.The Boogeyman however,is not.it has interesting story,some decent performances,and some unusual music/sound effects.it is readily apparent a low budget production,but i could watch it all,without having to pause to vomit,so that's something.no classic by any means,but still...for me The Boogeyman is a 5/10

I first saw this in the late 80s on a vhs n found it to be pretty disturbing and creepy.

Of course as a kid i didn't notice the blatant plagiarism but simply enjoyed the movie.

Revisited it recently n was kinda wtf man. It has shades of Amityville Horror, Halloween n a bit of The Exorcist regarding the exorcism.

The movie is still creepy n atmospheric but it has too many silly n wtf moments.

I always found Susanna Love beautiful but her filmography is too short.

Now lets talk bah some wtf stuff.

The mother's lover aint some voodoo specialist or some satanic cultist serial killer but his spirit gets trapped inside some ordinary mirror. Why n how, its never shown.

Lacey's husband Jake took the broken mirror n placed it in his home n tried fixing the broken pieces? Weird fella. Now who wud do that?

How come the mirror stayed intact for twenty years n none of the new owners tried to get rid of an old stuff?

Lacey's brother does the act from Of Mice and Men, he tries to kill a girl who seduces him in the barn. Now whether he gets possessed or he is simply a psycho is never shown.

In the end its never shown whether the priest survived or not?

What happened to the injured Jake?

And why wud they show Lacey visiting just a single grave when both her uncle n aunt died?

Why Jake didn't accompany her?

Till the end they never showed what happened to the mother and its just assumed that she is on her deathbed via the letter.

While it isn't a masterpiece, this movie really doesn't deserve such a low rating. It's clearly made with love and style and even has some passable acting and effects for it's low budget. Sadly, it's nothing groundbreaking and would be quickly discarded by casuals, so that's the reason I recommend it to horror movie fans. Don't expect a masterpiece. Expect a low budget passion work that clearly has it's flaws, but can serve as a nice afternoon entertainment. 5.8/10!

The Boogeyman (1980)

*** (out of 4)

As a child, Willy killed his mother's lover and all of it was reflected in a mirror and witnessed by his sister Lacey. Now, as adults, Lacey (Suzanna Love) begins to struggle so her husband recommend she go see a doctor (John Carradine). The doctor recommends she return to her childhood home and when she does she sees that mirror and breaks it. Soon a possession and murders follow.

Ulli Lommel's THE BOOGEYMAN is a rather effective horror film that I've always felt deserved to have a much better reputation. People have said it borrowed from HALLOWEEN and various possession films and perhaps it did but at the same time it has such a unique and weird atmosphere that you can't help get drawn into its story and the characters. THE BOOGEYMAN certainly deserves to be better remembered as it is quite effective.

The film shows what a talented director can do whenever he doesn't have too much money. The film has a terrific atmosphere that comes from the director's sense of style and especially the camera work. Just check out the sequence when Lacey is looking around the old house and the camera just basically floats around her making it seems as if someone is there waiting for her. The ending is also quite effective with the director using various color tints to build up a strong atmosphere.

The entire film really has a raw and creepy feel to it and all the credit must go to Lommel. The performances are a mixed bag but I think Love, while not the greatest actress, at least manages to keep us caught up in the story. You've also got John Carradine who shows up for a couple scenes, which means he was probably on the set for a day or two at most. The special effects are quite effective and especially the now somewhat notorious scissor death.

THE BOOGEYMAN has probably had its reputation lowered due to a couple really awful sequels, which is too bad because this is a rather effective movie.

"The Boogey Man" won't change your life, but if you've got eighty minutes to fill on a lazy summer evening, you could do a lot worse. The story revolves around pretty, charismatic Suzanna Love and her brother, who suddenly find themselves tormented by memories of a traumatic past. When they were children, the brother killed their mother's abusive lover...who comes back to haunt the siblings in just about the oddest conceivable manner. Derivative in spots, with a few subpar performances, but Love ably carries this relentlessly eerie film; horror icon John Carradine has a cameo as a psychiatrist who tries to convince our heroine that there is a rational explanation for the increasingly strange events in her life. Not the stuff of classics, but pretty good of its type.