George Lucas
Steve Guttenburg
and Drew Carey.
Just to name a few.
Raimi is having just the outline of his first name slapped on their for two reasons. #2) His plan to have someone remake Evil Dead. And first and foremost #1) His role as producer in Boogeyman.
Here we are 37 days into the New Year and we seriously have a movie that will more than likey end up as #1 on this end of the year list for the Top Ten Worst films.
It's not that this movie didn't have a good idea. I mean, jeeze, who wasn't afraid of their closet in the dark when they were a kid? I'm almost 25, and there are times when I'm kind of scared by my closet. But this movie failed to pull off anything interesting because it had no solid thread line on which the story could evolve.
Basically, as a kid Tim Jensen is afraid of his closet and all the creepy looking toys he has in his room. For Christ's sake he's got the meaning, foulest looking action figure I've ever seen staring down on him while he tries to sleep. I've got some pretty gnarly looking toys, but not 1 of them watch me as I close my eyes. Wisely, he puts everything that scares him away but something is still after him until his father intervenes. In a vane attempt to show Tim that there is nothing to be afraid of, Tim's father is sucked into the dark of the closet by the Boogeyman. As if that wasn't enough trauma for the poor kid, the Boogeyman shoves his father back into sight of his son while he is being shaked around like a rag doll on heroine. Back into the closet he goes, and the door slams shut, and I yawn with a wisened voice, aged over the years from having seen this tactic over a million times before.
So now Tim is all grown up, and he's having visions. For once, I'd like to get through one of these movies without someone getting visions or being psychic. Being psychic in a horror movie is just a cop out. The biggest cop out in the history of film, because it allows one of the stars of the film to do the exposition without giving anyone in the audience to figure out for themselves. So Tim finds himself back home and his dealing with the Boogeyman start all over again. And every creepy room he ventures in, every dark and mysterious closet he hesitantly investigates, not once does this idiot bring a flashlight or turn on a lamp. Seriously, what the hell is the deal with these idiots not turning on some source of illumination? I've investigated tons of creepy noises at night. But always at my side is a flashlight and a sword. Which I guess explains all the trips to the vet my poor dogs have to go on. Nonetheless, I still have that flashlight.
Through it all, this movie is seriously lacking on the talent to pull off a successful scare. It suffered very much of what I thought was wrong with The Grudge. It had way to much of the scares. If you relentlessly torment your audience with scares and jumps you're going to get them immune to it's effect by the time the finale shows up. And the finale is where you're supposed to put forth your best scares, how are you going to accomplish that when you've had everyone jumping for the past 2 hours? Although there were screams in the theatre that eventually died down as the movie progressed, I felt that the scares were a little predictable. Even if you've seen a fraction of the scary movies I have, you can tell instinctly by the music, the absence of the music, and the way the cameras were set up, that something was about to leap out at you and "scare" the crap out of you. Just a poor shoddy attempt.
The director of this mess is Stephen T. Kay. You might recognize him as the director in Lethal Weapn 2 who fired Murtough's daughter because Riggs jumped in and ruined a shot in the movie she was making. Other than that, and a few episodes of The Shield, there is nothing on Stephen T. Kay's resume that would suggest that he was able to tackle something like a scary movie. Although, Michael Chickless is pretty scary to watch on TV. The movie basically falls apart under his watch. There is no real continuity of the story. Characters are added dropped at a whim, and the final showdown between Tim and the Boogeyman makes so sense what-so-ever. I had an easier time understanding Fear and Loating in Las Vegas than this movie. While there were some interesting camera shots and techniques, it wasn't nearly enough to keep me interested in this movie, or the characters involved in it. They could have all died, and I wouldn't have worried about it for more than a half of a second. Maybe next time Mister Kay.
FINAL ANALYSIS!
Raimi is teetering on the edge here. He may be Sony's golden boy because of the Spider-Man movies, but he's still gotta have a life after they're finished. Where will he be when his legions of fans are finished with Spider-Man and remember things like, Boogeyman, and the remake of Evil Dead? He just better pray that Evil Dead 4 knocks one out of the park. While he didn't actually step behind the camera on this one, his name is in big bold letters at the beginning of the movie, and most everyone knows who he is by now. Just be careful, is all I'm saying.
Stephen T. Kay has potential. It's there. If I were Simon Cowell and he were a singer for American Idol, I'd tell him to try out again next year. After he's had some classes or something. He's not ready for the big leagues, and he needs to practice his craft a little more before he makes another big screen film.
What can I say except to stay away from this movie? It's a serious waste of money and you will hate each and every frame that plays in front of your eyes. It will make you want to dig them out with a rusty nail and then sit on them. Boogeyman will not amuse or scare you, it will on succeed at pissing you off.