Summary
A Stephen King short story makes for an effective horror, expanding on the source material while tapping into our fear of the dark.
If there are two certainties in life, it’s death and Stephen King adaptations. While the former has been fairly consistent in its finality, the latter hasn’t always been as successful as the master’s prose.
THE BOOGEYMAN, based on a 1973 short story that appeared in the Night Shift collection, uses the source material as a jumping off point to do its own thing. In the original story, King uses a simple structure of an unreliable witness relating his terrible tale to a psychologist before we get the devilish twist. It’s as much modern Gothic as it is Twilight Zone.
In Rob Savage’s film version it is the therapist’s family who are in the midst of tragedy. After the loss of his wife to an accident, Will (Chris Messina), his children Sadie (Sophie Thatcher) and Sawyer (Vivien Lyra Blair) all exhibit their own signs of trauma. When Will opens the door to unexpected walk-in client Lester Billings (David Dastmalchian), he inadvertently lets in a presence that wants to attack his kids when they are most vulnerable.
Adapted to the screen by Scott Beck, Bryan Woods, and Mark Heyman, one of the uphill battles was translating this slender story to a feature-length scarefest. The expansion of the lore is quite well done, and it was a wise move making someone other than the unhinged Billings the centre of the story. The beauty of the film’s structure is that the entirety of the short story could have still happened off screen.
Like many films in this specific sub-genre of horror, the principal weapon for fear is the jump scare. This works here thanks to a phenomenal use of the soundscape. The titular character, with all of its requisite grunts and growls, can be heard coming from all directions, as if to immerse us in darkness just outside the closet door. If King has spent his career sharing tangible fears with us, then this is a film that trades on our primal fear of the dark.
As such, photographer Eli Born (who shot the most recent Hellraiser) relies on those lights and shadows. There’s a creepy house that Sadie visits several times, one that is illuminated only by a sporadically flashing bulb and corridors full of candles. In another scene, a slowly pulsing red light draws us into darkness with terrifying results. There’s a recurring motif of Sawyer’s circular night light, one which the audience might also want to desperately cling to, as Savage and Born take us down certain corridors.
Messina seems to sleepwalk through his scenes, partly appropriate for the distance his character has created from his kids. Indeed, he’s completely absent for long stretches of the film – whether intentionally or through the edit. So, it’s up to the two very capable young stars Thatcher (Yellowjackets) and Blair (Obi-Wan Kenobi) to carry this off. Which they do spectacularly. Through their eyes, it’s a nightmarish Monsters Inc.
THE BOOGEYMAN is probably never destined to reach the iconic heights of some of Stephen King’s other works. Yet the moment to moment scares are effective, especially in the environment of a darkened cinema. Indeed, it was King who suggested to Savage that they’d be “fucking stupid to release this on streaming and not in cinemas.” It’s a good thing they listened. Now, if you don’t mind I’m just going to close that closet door.
2023 | USA | DIRECTOR: Rob Savage | WRITERS: Scott Beck, Bryan Woods and Mark Heyman (based on a story by Stephen King) | CAST: Sophie Thatcher, Chris Messina, Vivien Lyra Blair, David Dastmalchian | DISTRIBUTOR: 20th Century Studios | RUNNING TIME: 99 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 1 June 2023 (AUS), 2 June 2023 (USA)
