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lavender-montgomery · 4 years

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Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark (2019) - Thoughts [SPOILERS]

So I finished watching this movie about 51 seconds ago. I was very excited for this film when it was first announced. I only read one of the books when I was a kid and I don’t remember it, I was more a Goosebumps and Pointe Horror kid, however I was still excited. I saw the trailer I believe before Annabelle: Creation when I went with my friend, and we vowed to go see it in the cinema. Spoiler: We didn’t go see it in the cinema. I completely forgot. This was August 2019. It is now March 2020 and I have only just remembered, so I watched it for free online. Don’t tell the police. I’m kinda glad I didn’t pay to go see it, although I do feel it woulda been better in the cinema environment with the surround sound. If you’re watching this on a computer I 10/10 recommend wearing headphones/earphones. I put mine in half way through and it improved it greatly, even when my laptop was on full blast.

So the film starts and immediately I notice it’s set in the past when President Nixon was a thing, so correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that was early 70s. I dunno, I’m British and don’t know much about American history. It also begins on Halloween - excellent, we’re off to a great, spooky start already. A touch I appreciated was the Halloween costumes the cast were wearing. Home made costumes of a spider, a clown and a witch. Loved them, kids don’t wear stuff like that anymore. I’d love to have costumes like that. So it starts off with the three main characters getting revenge on some bullies - pretty standard. One character annoys me when he takes it too far by throwing a bag of poop lit on fire into the bully’s car - which his big sister is sat in. Oops. Can’t help but judge this character already as that was pretty stupid. Didn’t bother me that much though as I’d forgotten about it until going over my notes just now. The kids hide in someone’s car at a drive thru, in comes the fourth main character, Ramone. That’s another thing I loved, the drive thu showing a black and white horror film on Halloween night, all of the old cars pulled up. That’s a rare thing nowadays, I think in the twelve years I have lived here I’ve only seen one drive thru - and I have kept an eye out always as I’ve wanted to go to one since seeing Greece when I was a kid.

Obviously the kids make the stupid decision to go to the town’s creepy house that has a scary story attached to it. What else would they do? And also obviously they find a secret door no one has ever found so OBVIOUSLY they have to go through it and get locked in by the bullies. Duh.

I noticed this movie has a very dark colour scheme. I get that adds to the spookiness, but damn I’d like to be able to see what’s going on every once in a while. I kept adjusting my laptop and moving the screen but to no avail.

What’s the scary story, you ask? There was a family who lived there who had a daughter named Sarah who killed a load of kids in the town who then killed herself. Please note the whole plot of the movie revolves around Sarah’s book of scary stories that come true and kill kids, and she writes in it in the afterlife. I was a bit confused about if this book killed kids before the movie was set and it was a known thing, or if it happened for the first time in this movie. I THINK it supposedly happened before but I can’t say for certain - I was texting when this was spoken about, my bad.

Something that had me frowning was when they went into this secret room that was supposedly locked for a hundred years... The candles were lit. Why? How? I didn’t see any of the kids light the candles, but there they were, lit and burning bright as anything. Like I mentioned, they get locked in this room along with their big sister by the school bully they through the firey poop at. But the book sets them free. Somehow.

Come to think of it, it must be known that the book has killed kids as they mention it. Silly me. So nerd girl Stella continues to read after being told it kills kids... Stella, are you thick? Characters like that drive me mad. She even took the book home. Dumb ass. Then again, she is a huge horror fanatic as her bedroom is plastered in horror film stuff, and she’s a mega nerd, so how could she not take the book? I would. It’s a bit spooky when she’s looking at the book later on and it isn’t finished and ink is still wet as it’s still being written. Reminded me of in Harry Potter.

I started to suspect this movie would be like the Goosebumps movies. It was more what the Goosebumps movies shoulda been - no offense to those movies or the cast, I just feel they were aimed at an audience younger than the book audience both old and new.

The first monster we saw was the scarecrow. He was a bit creepy. I realised all the monsters in it are targeting specific kids with their worst fear. ‘You don’t read the book, the book reads you.’ The scene with the scarecrow made me think of umm I think it was called In The Tall Grass on Netflix, because of the dark corn field, the sound of the plants in the wind and the fact he couldn’t get out of the field. What I don’t get when the bully Tommy died, he turned into a scarecrow - why was this scarecrow not found? It still looked like him.

Ruth. Ruth is one of the kid’s big sister. She’s beautiful. Not much to say on her really, she wasn’t in it THAT much. But she was incredibly pretty.

I liked the part where Stella took the book back to the house then when she went home, Ramone found it in her bedroom. It was a bit cliche but it worked.

The next monster we saw was a scary ghostly figure missing her toe. The kid this ghost was targeting stupidly hid under his bed while the door was being opened then only seconds later he emerged. Suprise surprise he was taken/killed. I’d be under that bed all night if it was me, stuff coming out seconds after the door is opened. He did a quick look left and right then that was it. Made me feel a bit grim when he almost ate this ghost’s toe in the stew in the fridge. Bit of background: the ghost walks around saying ‘who took my toe’ as the toe is missing off her/his body. Not sure why. I’m sure there was a reason why this kid was scared of this monster but I don’t remember it and for some reason I didn’t take note. Feel free to let me know and I’ll add it on.

The next monster we saw wasn’t really a monster, it was spiders. A lot of them. Which, to be honest, is the worst one of all the horror characters as I am extremely terrified of spiders. The sister Ruth had them all crawling out of a ginourmous zit/spider bite on her face. It’s quite sad that she’s hospitalised for her breakdown and is absent for almost the whole rest of the movie. I quite liked her, woulda liked for her to be in it more. The scene where she’s covered in spiders reminded me of one of my psychosis hallucinations that I have bugs all over my body, hundreds of them running over me - before anyone asks, yes, it is scary.

So for some reason there’s a character called Lulu who is an old lady who I think is blind and she’s a bit off her rocker. When she was a child she was friends with Sarah. She didn’t really do much for the story. The only benefit was they found out Sarah killed herself at hospital not at home, but I’m sure they coulda discovered that elsewhere. It’s a shame as she was a very interesting character. It was a bit creepy when the music box just like Sarah’s starts playing and Lulu sings along, then when Sarah’s book is shown the music stops.

The sad part about Sarah is her family had her sent to the hospital and they lied about everything. Her own brother was her doctor, giving her electroconvulsive therapy and abusing her. No wonder she came back and killed a load of kids, she was put through a lot in her childhood when she was completely innocent, she wanted to help. She didn’t do anything she was accused of. In voice recordings of her interview she kept saying ‘I didn’t do it’ and you could hear her get electrocuted. This made me so sad, I really felt for her. She tried to save the kids by telling people what her family were doing to the water, so her family framed her. Tragic. It was a bit creepy when after this part, the recording they were listening to then spoke to them saying ‘I’ll tell you what you want to hear’. One of the creepiest parts of the film, sadly.

The next monster we saw was the fat pale lady. She was a bit creepy and weird, my favourite monster out of all of them. She didn’t really do much, though. But her design was cool. The costume was so well done, she was chilling and realistic. The teen she was after couldn’t run away, no matter which way he turned she was there. I’ve had a nightmare similar to that, so the scene gave me a bit of anxiety. She looked how I imagined Umbridge in the Harry Potter books before she was in the movies.

Broke my heart a little when the girl Stella was on the phone to her dad. He was so worried and wanted to help but he couldn’t. You could tell he really loved her, especially after everything they’ve been through what with the mum leaving.

It took me ages to catch on - each monster/story is of the victim’s worst fear.

Next monster was the Jangly man. He was also very well done. The way he moved was unnatural and creepy. I feel they overdone the dead look and sound effects but that’s okay. He was truly disturbing. I loved how he managed to squeeze between the bars in the police cell to get to Ramone. Also loved how he could dismember himself and put him back together.

I appreciated how the film wasn’t reliant on jump scares like something I watched recently *cough* Brahms: The Boy II *cough*. The monsters in this mighta scared me if I was a young kid.

So it ends with the girl Sarah who was writing the stories was doing it for revenge, and Stella talks her into stopping. Predictable ending but it worked. I liked when Stella became Sarah back in the past when she was locked up and they didn’t know she wasn’t Sarah. When Stella was locked in the basement, everything went back to normal and she was Stella gain. The creepy music box played again and Sarah appeared, angry. I felt the acting in this scene wasn’t great, it was like watching a year eleven GCSE drama duologue.

When Ramone was drafted and he said goodbye to Stella, they shown that they had feelings but they didn’t kiss which I am glad about. That would have been a very cheesy ending to the movie.

Is there going to be a sequel? It ended with Stella, Ruth and dad going on a hunt with the book as Stella thinks the book can bring back all the kids that went missing due to the stories. Will it work? Maybe in another movie? I kinda hope not. I most likely won’t watch it, this movie wasn’t good enough for a sequel. The script and cast were meh, the plot was eh, I’m rating it a 4/10 and that’s being generous. Wouldn’t recommend to others especially adults and I won’t be watching again - I am so glad I didn’t pay to go to the cinema to see this.

#scary stories to tell in the dark #movie review #horror movie review #horror film review #film review #ssttitd #goosebumps #mine #my post

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