DARKNESS FALLS
Article courtesy of Andrea Chase of KillerMovieReviews.com

DARKNESS FALLS, USA, 2002, MPAA Rating: PG-13 for terror and horror images, and brief language

The best thing about DARKNESS FALLS is the fact that we will be able to settle once and for all whether or not there is a tooth fairy. If he or she exists, there is bound to be a lawsuit over how he or she is depicted in this film. Actually, not so much the depiction, though positing a tooth fairy more interested in killing any newly de-toothed child that catches a glimpse of her rather than leaving money is a premise certainly worthy of some sort of punitive action, as for the quality of the film itself. To call it dreck would be showing more mercy than it shows its audience.

While the direction by Jonathan Liebesman has a few scant moments of genuine shock value, mostly there are laughs. Most of them unintentional. Or so we can only hope. This is the sort of film where when someone says, “We’ll be safe here!” you can be sure that he or she is the next one slated for an ugly demise. In fact, it’s just such lines that propel the script because heavens forefend that we not have the next scary bump in the night telegraphed to us as early and often as possible before actually seeing it.

And then there’s the monster herself, the tooth fairy gone bad. The problem is, she’s not terribly scary. This may be the actual reason that we see so little of her and then only fleetingly rather than the fact that a sudden bright light will fire her up like a distress flare. She floats about in a porcelain mask and a wispy cape looking not unlike a more feminine version of the phantom of the opera. Sure, she occasionally swoops in on a victim, but looking as she does like a refugee from an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, the only way to even try to raise a goose bump or two is by adding very loud, very portentous music mixed with a few growly undertones. Even so, you expect everyone on screen to break into a chorus of “The Magic of the Night” or ”All I Ask of You.”

The cast, Emma Caulfield, Chaney Kley, and, because of THE SIXTH SENSE, the inevitable spooky little boy, in this case, Lee Cormie, all play their parts with the sort of grim determination of actors adding more tape to their demo reels. They look confused on cue, they look scared on cue, and, of course, Ms Caulfied strips down to the requisite scanty tank top during the final chase sequence.

I could go on about the lack of internal logic, such things as elevators working during a power outage, but why bother? DARKNESS FALLS is a quick and cheap horror flick that will come and go in less time than it takes for you to finish reading this review.

ANDREA CHASE

My Rating:

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