Sometimes, a twist is better. When trying to establish tension in a proposed psychological thriller, it is never a good idea to identify your villain right off the bat. Usually, a couple of red herrings and some direct but deceptive misfires are required in order to get the audience involved and the suspense started. On the other hand, if you give away your evil upfront, you run into the problem of payoff. No matter the narrative invention or character creativity, everything is leading to a finale forewarned and anticipated. Thus we have the major issue surrounding the lame Dennis Quaid vehicle Beneath the Darkness. Like a episode of Columbo, we know who the baddie is almost from the get go. How the horror is exposed therefore becomes the movie's reason for being - and it's not a very good motive.
In the small town of Smithville, Texas, part of the local teen population, including gloomy Gus Travis (Tony Oller), his best buddies Danny (Devon Werkheiser) and Brian (Stephen Lunsford), along with cheerleading hottie Abby (Aimee Teegarden), fancy themselves amateur ghost hunters. Among the places they fixate on is the supposedly haunted funeral home run by former football hero turned "weird" mortician Vaughn Ely (Quaid). One night, they see him dancing with what appears to be a corpse. Breaking in to investigate, one of the group meets a tragic end. Now, it is up to our hero and his remaining pals to expose Ely for the raging psychopath he is - that is before he finds a way to make their deaths look like an "accident" as well.
While he does his best to invest this limp genre effort with something for fright fans to sink their teeth into, Quaid can't save Beneath the Darkness. He's a good actor, just not when it comes to playing malevolent. He's not insane enough, the character not properly positioned as the kind of hysterical monster one loves to hate. Instead, he is stuck within the cliched concept of the upright citizen that no one suspects of horrific foul play...even though the movie gives him away upfront. As we wait for the rest of Smithville to wake up and smell the rotting corpses, Quaid rolls his eyes and spews sodden spook show bon mots. This leaves us latched onto the adolescents in the cast, and for the most part, they are as memorable as a brain fart.
Perhaps this will teach director Martin Guigui to stay well within his creative comfort zone - or level of artistic ability. There is nothing remotely scary in either the set-up or the execution and by the time we get to the standard cat and mouse finale, our attention span has long since lagged. Guigui just doesn't get the basics of the fright film. We don't want whining and complaining. We don't like leads who seem lost in their own psychological swamp (Travis has a backstory that explains his sullen expressions). We want a viable threat and victim fodder. Filter through some gore and bit of dread, and everyone goes home happy.
Sadly, no one will be delighted with Beneath the Darkness. While it pretends to be Disturbia with a decidedly Southwestern flair, it's really nothing more than a turgid, rote experiment in drivel. Again, there is nothing wrong with delivering your denouement up front. Just make sure you have something to offer once the curtain has been drawn back. With this flawed film, the only thing seen upon reveal is the shoddy production value and the star struggling at the center to make it all work...and that's not what a scary movie is supposed to do.
While he does his best to invest this limp genre effort with something for fright fans to sink their teeth into, Quaid can't save Beneath the Darkness. He's a good actor, just not when it comes to playing malevolent. He's not insane enough, the character not properly positioned as the kind of hysterical monster one loves to hate. Instead, he is stuck within the cliched concept of the upright citizen that no one suspects of horrific foul play...even though the movie gives him away upfront. As we wait for the rest of Smithville to wake up and smell the rotting corpses, Quaid rolls his eyes and spews sodden spook show bon mots. This leaves us latched onto the adolescents in the cast, and for the most part, they are as memorable as a brain fart.
Perhaps this will teach director Martin Guigui to stay well within his creative comfort zone - or level of artistic ability. There is nothing remotely scary in either the set-up or the execution and by the time we get to the standard cat and mouse finale, our attention span has long since lagged. Guigui just doesn't get the basics of the fright film. We don't want whining and complaining. We don't like leads who seem lost in their own psychological swamp (Travis has a backstory that explains his sullen expressions). We want a viable threat and victim fodder. Filter through some gore and bit of dread, and everyone goes home happy.
Sadly, no one will be delighted with Beneath the Darkness. While it pretends to be Disturbia with a decidedly Southwestern flair, it's really nothing more than a turgid, rote experiment in drivel. Again, there is nothing wrong with delivering your denouement up front. Just make sure you have something to offer once the curtain has been drawn back. With this flawed film, the only thing seen upon reveal is the shoddy production value and the star struggling at the center to make it all work...and that's not what a scary movie is supposed to do.
