The Darkness

Not a bad horror movie, kept me engaged until the end.

It's a slow-bulding story, with a great cast who unfortunately doesn't get a lot of moments to shine (although I think many will find Lucy Fry a nice surprise like I did!). The suspense is well done, and I did find the movie satisfactory overall. I mean, it's not amazing, it didn't make me jump, but I was entertained, and I got into the characters too. Regarding other comment on this page, I think it's unfair to compare it to Poltergeist. There are many takes on poltergeist/haunted house stories, and this is just another one. The mythology did feel a bit weak, but the story still ran smoothly despite that. Surely, the final 15min would have been better had there been more background on the Anasazi, but really, not too big of a deal once you're hooked.
If I had to mention a real problem with it, is that it's part of that trend which tends to associate children within the specter with abnormal/evil behavior. I get it that taking a "strange child" as a catalyst is great for effect, but it's a disservice to all people trying hard to bring clarity on the issue, you know? It's good for story telling and all, but a bit disrespectful, in my opinion.

I recently saw another horror/thriller with Kevin Bacon called "You Should Have Left" which I thought was sub-par. This was much better.

This is a poor twist of the poltergeist. Do your self a favour and the original poltergeist instead.

There is nothing here that you haven't seen before. Its competently made but lacks scares or shocks. A disappointment from the director of Wolf Creek.

The Darkness is a derivative horror film that’s not all that frightening. After returning from a camping trip a young boy starts exhibiting strange behavior that concern his parents, leading them to believe that he might be possessed. Starring Kevin Bacon, Radha Mitchell, and Lucy Fry, the film has a decent cast that gives solid performances. And the characters are especially well-written; particularly in how the parents workout and come to accept what’s happening to their son. However, the special effects are rather weak and the possession stuff is cliché. Yet while it has its problems, The Darkness is mildly entertaining and has its moments.

High production value, moderate to average acting, overall the film was very slow and uneventful. The action only picked up towards the end but left more to be desired. Wasn’t intolerable but was an acceptable horror film to passively watch.

while I don't understand why this movie is being compared to 'Poltergeist' I did however find the movie to be overall poor. For such a great cast lineup I was expecting better, the first half of the movie was very sketchy and just all over the place, things just happened and all at once and I felt I had no idea what was going on, or why it happened. When that eventually did die down it just came to a very lame and unrealistic end. There was never any real jumps or scares, maybe a few atmospheric moments at best. I had only just realised from a comment below that this is the producer from 'wolf creek' which is even more disappointing as I LOVE that film.

The movie could have used more Jennifer Morrison too, but that may just be me and my personal taste! :P

But yeah all jokes aside just a week urban myth story with no real substance.

Not content in dehumanizing just autistic people or native Americans, this movie makes the extra effort to get them both, all while sucking completely. The cast rocks, though. Always love seeing Kevin Bacon in this crappy horror flicks just because I know he's a horror fan.

Well, this one was full of dick swinging and a lot of “alpha males” with 20-30 year younger wives, whom they all disrespect. Strong start.

I did like the
“Your god cannot help you now” though.

I like how we can just blame the marital problems on demons from the third world, we don’t need to work on it or anything.

And then it gets very convenient, what with the portal, and Mikey suddenly going from “wheeee I love my new friends” to “ok imma save you now”. So random.