A horror film on Christmas day seems like the works of the evil spirits rather than Jesus Christ. Darkness makes its way into theatres silently with only a specific type of audience. Well, that small audience will be incredibly disappointed when they walk towards their nearest theatre and say, one for Darkness please. "Ouch!" Was one of the first things I said after the screening of Darkness and it wasn't because I fell down.
I shall attempt to go through this entire review without blowing up, so to speak. As professional as possible is the key when it comes to retaining yourself from attacking a film. However, after witnessing Darkness and concluding the year for horror movies, I am terribly shocked at how such a film could get a wide release in theatres. I'm also shocked at how bad a horror film could get.
This film is written and directed by Jaume Balagueró. He has brought up a screenplay that is a one of a kind mess and leaves the audience empty and disgusted of what was in its running time. There are unspeakable horrors of flaws in Darkness and the film itself is confused on what plot to deliver. This film is plotless and never finds itself within an impressive supernatural feel.
It is these type of horror films that give the horror genre a bad wrap. Slashers are among that region as well, but have some redeeming qualities at times, Darkness has none. To lay your eyes on the screen showing Darkness might make you want to get out of your seat quickly. Darkness clearly wanted to deliver a film involving ghosts, in other words, the dead is surrounding their house and they want them out.
It is lame to think for once that someone from the dead actually is alive or vice versa. To add to what already has been bashed, Darkness seems to have a lot of similarities to other horror films, but instead Darkness does it very very badly. The Ring easily comes to mind in some scenes involving pictures and The Others easily comes to mind with the twists it tries to pull.
I cannot come to the conclusion of why the actors were so bad. Iain Glen who plays Mark in this film is just plain horrendous. A couple of his scenes are repetitive involving cutting potatoes and they are extremely laughable. His scenes are poorly acted to the point that you have to turn away. The only person that tried at least a bit hard was Anna Paquin who plays Regina in this film.
A low budget horror film this isn't either. At twelve million dollars, it clearly went into the cast and crews pocket because this film should be no more than two dollars or three on a good day. Remember that Darkness is a film that can become tedious after it takes you into scenes that reverse the film rather than advancing it. For ending fanatics out there, if you see the ending to Darkness you will either have the biggest laugh ever or you will still have a million unanswered questions, unlike other films you won't want them answered nor care for them.
Darkness is a film about plot holes, poor acting, horrorless visuals and a love for cheap scares that will only end up annoying audiences.. Just as I thought I'd seen all that 2004 had to offer, this film grabbed and laid out the biggest mess of the year. There aren't specific things in Darkness that could have been fixed, the entire film is horror at its worst. Darkness is a dirty mess beyond repair. Films as horrific as Darkness doesn't come around quite often and I can easily label this film as one of the worst horror films in quite sometime.
