Some people in this world, afraid of the dark, not just afraid of the dark. They are even afraid of the black stuff. They have not been hurt, or is that natural is the case? If the injury is received, then what kind of damage is received will have a fear of it such a big heart.
Producer and cowriter Guillermo del Toro and director Troy Nixey manage a lot of creepy atmosphere in their story of a couple (Guy Pearce and Katie Holmes) and a young girl menaced by nasty little things that swarm up from beneath the mansion they're restoring.
With the girl at the heart of the tale and del Toro's name the big selling point, the filmmakers want you to think of the movie as a cousin to his masterful "Pan's Labyrinth," another story of a girl caught up in a world of fantastical terror.
"Don't Be Afraid of the Dark" is an awfully tame cousin, though, the creatures uninvolving and their antics more irritating than petrifying.
Based on a 1973 television movie that starred Kim Darby and Jim Hutton, this update from del Toro and cowriter Matthew Robbins has architect Alex Hurst (Pearce) and girlfriend and collaborator Kim (Holmes) in the home stretch of their restoration of Blackwood Manor.
A promising prologue lays out terrible doings that beset the manor's old master, who discovered that small, ravenous creatures with an appetite for children's teeth were living below his home.
What perfect timing that the arrival of Alex's moody daughter, Sally (Bailee Madison), leads to the discovery and unsealing of a secret basement that was sealed decades ago to imprison the creatures, known as the homunculi. Now the monsters have freedom to roam the house through the air ducts and a child with a mouth full of tasty calcium.
Speaking in whispery voices, the homunculi are obnoxious taunters more than predators for much of the movie. They deliver "Gremlins"-style havoc but no "Gremlins"-style gags. Naturally, Alex and Kim don't believe Sally's wild tales of monsters stalking her, assuming instead that the girl is just acting out over the neglectful mom who packed her off to Blackwood Manor, her inattentive dad and his interloper girlfriend.
The thinly developed characters move in narrow emotional ranges. Humans wander around with perpetually furrowed brows, and homunculi scoot about like the hissy, conniving little creeps they are.
The tension del Toro and Nixey create promises much more than it delivers. When the homunculi finally step up the action, their confrontations with the humans seem more silly than scary.
Monster is worthy of fear, but some of the monster is really cute. You do not need to fear them. In fact, they will not hurt you, but you think the world of monsters are terrible, so your subconscious mind which has long had a fear of their emotions. Such sentiments are not easily go away.
