Grade (D)

Not even the great Kevin Bacon could save this recycled horror film.

Another of the what I call ‘young adult horror’ films is out and “The Darkness” is fading from my memory while I write as not even Kevin Bacon could save this one.

The Darkness is the story of a family who upon returning from their trip to the Grand Canyon find their home haunted by and ancient supernatural force that first targets their young boy, then all of them.

This film stars Kevin Bacon and Radha Mitchell, two actors I really like, but who despite their efforts could not keep this from being a lazy recycling of the many PG-13 horror films that fill a run-time with cheap jump scares, routine genre tropes, and unfinished story arcs.

Admittedly like many of these types of films the first-act was pretty intriguing and set-up potential for a story. One that would not come close to being met as the rest of the film is filled with subplots that simply filled time. With all the usual family drama, the search for clues, the fracturing of a relationship, stress at work, young children not afraid of ghosts, yada, yada, yada.

I would honestly say Radha Mitchells performance was the strongest of the entire cast, she delivered a strong sense of emotion and effort in her role that for brief moments would pull me in, until I remembered what I was watching.

Kevin Bacon was good; he was what the role called for, which in my opinion was a waste of his talents. During some of the more climactic moments Bacon was often off in the background with a flashlight, or not even in the scene at all.

In the end this film brought nothing new to the genre and takes you on the same story we have been taken on so many times over the years, that by the day’s end this will be a completely forgotten movie. It showed little ambition in creativity and with the frightening attempts being so foreshadowed, none land with any impact. Much of the bulk of this story was simply boring and the third-act was so cliché it was completely anti-climactic, making this one simply not worth the time.

Time: 92 min

MPAA Rating: PG-13 (For thematic elements, some disturbing violence, brief sensuality and language)