Based on the short story by Stephen King, The Boogeyman tells the story of widower Will Harper (Chris Messina) and his daughters, Sadie (Sophie Thatcher, The Book of Boba Fett) and Sawyer (Vivian Lyra Blair of Obi-Wan Kenobi fame) as the deal with the grief from losing their matriarch in a car accident. Will is a therapist who works out of his home. When Lester Billings (David Dastmalchian) shows up asking for an appointment, Will very quickly realizes that the man is disturbed as he talks about how his children were killed by some monster and everyone believes that he was the real killer. Lester hangs himself inside Will’s house, and the entity that killed his children attaches itself to Will’s family setting off a series of events that leads to all three of them being in danger.
This film is great at the scares and terrifying imagery. It fails a little in the story department as it fails to connect one event to the next and loses the emotional thread that the first third of the movie works so heard to build. At one point, Sadie has her high school friends over. They lock her in the room where Lester killed himself as a joke, and when Sadie escapes, they have a huge falling out. The run from the house, telling Will that their daughter is crazy on their way out, and then suddenly to film jumps to Sawyer playing video games. Any normal parent would want to know why a situation like that happened at all, but the film just ignores it.
The second and third acts are littered with events that have little bearing on the next except to create atmosphere. In that respect, they succeed in creating one moody scare after another, but caring what happens to the characters gets lost when the film misses out on the relationship between Will and his kids.
The cast does a great job here, and it’s certainly a watchable horror film. It’s just not one that will make it into my yearly October horror marathon. A middle of the road entry into the Stephen King cannon. Certainly not the worst adaptation, (I’m looking at you The Dark Tower) but not the best either.
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Becky Tyler Art and Photography 
Based on the short story by Stephen King, The Boogeyman tells the story of widower Will Harper (Chris Messina) and his daughters, Sadie (Sophie Thatcher, The Book of Boba Fett) and Sawyer (Vivian Lyra Blair of Obi-Wan Kenobi fame) as the deal with the grief from losing their matriarch in a car accident. Will is a therapist who works out of his home. When Lester Billings (David Dastmalchian) shows up asking for an appointment, Will very quickly realizes that the man is disturbed as he talks about how his children were killed by some monster and everyone believes that he was the real killer. Lester hangs himself inside Will’s house, and the entity that killed his children attaches itself to Will’s family setting off a series of events that leads to all three of them being in danger.
This film is great at the scares and terrifying imagery. It fails a little in the story department as it fails to connect one event to the next and loses the emotional thread that the first third of the movie works so heard to build. At one point, Sadie has her high school friends over. They lock her in the room where Lester killed himself as a joke, and when Sadie escapes, they have a huge falling out. The run from the house, telling Will that their daughter is crazy on their way out, and then suddenly to film jumps to Sawyer playing video games. Any normal parent would want to know why a situation like that happened at all, but the film just ignores it.
The second and third acts are littered with events that have little bearing on the next except to create atmosphere. In that respect, they succeed in creating one moody scare after another, but caring what happens to the characters gets lost when the film misses out on the relationship between Will and his kids.
The cast does a great job here, and it’s certainly a watchable horror film. It’s just not one that will make it into my yearly October horror marathon. A middle of the road entry into the Stephen King cannon. Certainly not the worst adaptation, (I’m looking at you The Dark Tower) but not the best either.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
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