25 - Don't Be Afraid of the Dark

    I've been looking forward to seeing this, but I needed to rent the DVD - there's enough whispered dialogue that I needed to have subtitles available.  It's an interesting movie.  It looks spectacular, the sets are fantastic.  The basement looks incredible.

    The plot has a young girl inadvertently setting a bunch of little goblin creatures free from captivity in a furnace under the basement.  It's a remake of a fairly well known made-for-tv movie from 1973.

    It probably would have been more effective in a theater.  There was one thing that I really didn't like.  The girl takes lots of pictures of the creatures.  One of the creatures has an arm severed.  Neither of these things are pointed out in an effort to convince the adults.  The ending of the movie seemed really dark, surprisingly brutal for the measured tone that the rest of it takes.

    And Guillermo del Toro's influence was really sort of pervasive.  I'd rather that he left some of his influence off it.  I'd rather that it maintained the other atmosphere, which reminded me of Coraline.