Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (2011)

Guillermo del Toro is a big fan of the original TV movie Don't Be Afraid of the Dark. He apparently loved the film so much as a child that it inspired him to create his own horror films. After years of making his own excellent, original films, he decided to go back to the beginning and co-write and co-produce a remake of the film that started his love affair with horror and fantasy. The director's chair is filled by first-timer Troy Nixey, who was hired by del Toro on the basis of a short film he sent in to him.

Very similar to the original, the remake has two main differences. Firstly, there is an opening scene set in the house in the 1800s that sees painter Emerson Blackwood (Garry McDonald) attempt to get his child back from the creatures, only to be dragged down into the fireplace by them. Secondly, there is a new character: a young girl, who becomes the focus of the creature's attention. Ten-year-old Sally is played by Bailee Madison and moves into the large mansion with her father Alex (Guy Pearce) and her father's partner, Kim (Katie Holmes). Sally is the one who opens the grate of the fireplace in the basement and unwittingly sets the creatures loose and is the one they try and take.

Having a child become the focus of the creature's attention is an interesting move. It's a pity that it doesn't work. For starters, the metaphor from the previous film could have been turned into one about parents not believing children and making us wonder whether she really was seeing the creatures or if they're the product of her imagination, driven to despair after being sent away by her mother to live with her distant father and his girlfriend. Instead, we're told right up front that the creatures are real. There's no subtlety or hint of delusion: she's sane, they're real and the adults are morons. There's the usual cranky old caretaker who warns them not to open the fireplace but he's ignored. Secondly, we know all along that she's in no real danger. She's a little girl in a horror film. When was the last time something bad happened to a little girl? Anyone?

In contrast to the original, the creatures are not actors in laughably bad masks, they're all CGI. They're not laughably silly but they aren't in the slightest bit scary either. They're like rats crossed with goblins and about as scary as toast popping up from a toaster. If you don't like rodents, you might find them unnerving. Otherwise, you'll just wonder why people don't stamp on them or pick them up and throw them away.

Just like the original, there are irrelevant characters, namely the psychiatrist (Nicholas Bell) and Charles Jacoby (Alan Dale), and pointless scenes. In particular, the dinner party. The dinner party in the first film was a small gathering of friends before the half-way point. In the remake, it's greatly expanded and moved to the final act. Alex and Kim entertain Charles, in the hope that he will be impressed by their restoration work on the house which will lead to them being featured on the cover of a magazine which means they can sell the place for a big profit and recoup Alex's losses and avoid bankruptcy. Got all that? Good. As Alex wines and dines Charles and a dozen other nameless people, Sally pursues a creature to the library, determined to get photographic evidence of it with an old Polaroid camera. Once inside the room, the creatures lock the door and attack her. She takes lots of pictures but none of them look like they will come out clearly and all her efforts seem to have been in vain. That is, until she squashes one of them between two bookcases and its arm falls off. Success! She has incontrovertible proof! Not just its lifeless body, trapped between the two pieces of furniture, but also its newly detached limb. So, when the library door bursts open and her father and his guests come rushing in, full of concern for little Sally, do they see the body of the creature? Well, no. Does she at least show them its severed arm? Uh.... no. She just gives her father one of the pictures, which is far too blurry to see anything. Then the guests leave and she's put to bed, her father still refusing to believe her. Seriously, that's exactly what happens and it's completely fucking stupid. She has proof of the creatures' existence less than ten feet behind her but no-one notices and she doesn't tell anyone either! It's not even like she accidentally kills the creature, she deliberately squashes it and looks at it as it's arm falls off and lands on the floor. We even get a close-up of the bloody thing hitting the ground!

That's just the most egregious example of several gaping plot holes. Combine them with the pointless characters and scenes that should have ended on the cutting room floor and it sounds like this film's worse than the first one. Not quite. It still feels entirely pointless but there's no denying that the film looks absolutely superb. For starters, everything's bigger - the CGI, the house, the performances, particularly from Bailee Madison. It's just a pity that it's all wasted. It doesn't even have any good scares, something you'd expect from a horror film written and produced by Guillermo del Toro. In fact, the biggest (and probably only) jump in the film was given away in the trailer!

So, what do we have? A pointless remake of a laughably bad 1970s horror film. It's bigger, full of lavish sets and a wonderful, grand old house. The performances are much better and it's directed competently. Unfortunately, it's not in the slightest bit scary or even unnerving and the chance to make us wonder if what Sally's seeing is real or just a fantasy is wasted. It's riddled with plot holes and groaning under the weight of pointless characters and scenes that should have appeared only in the special features. It's an improvement on the original, but just barely.

4 out of 10.