THEY
As opposed to Them, It, or You Are Not I. Dear readers,
I'm afraid contemporary horror slouches ever closer to redundancy: once more a
provocative premise devolves into laughable clichés, histrionic hand
wringing, and overwrought effects. Wes Craven (who used to be cool) merely
"presents" this one, as he did the anemic Dracula 2000. Directed by
Robert Harmon and Zbigniew Karspruk, They asks the unsettling question: what if
there really are monsters under kids' beds? Julia (androgynous, forgettable
Laura Regan) is a driven, athletic young woman who suffered from night terrors
as a kid. Long-time friend and fellow night-terror-sufferer Billy calls out of
the blue to say that "they're back" and he can't hack it. Their childhood
friends converge at his funeral and grudgingly admit that these long-ago demons
have also reappeared in their own hip urban lives. Julia, a PhD candidate in
psychology, decides to figure out the scientific basis for what's going on. Her
supportive EMT boyfriend (whitebread hunk Marc Lucas, Buffy's Riley
Finn), not unreasonably, thinks she's nuts. Eventually we move into Lucio Fulci
territory (think The Beyond with a tomboy heroine) and that gray land
from which stolen children never return. A pity Mr. Craven's recent film
projects cannot be similarly banished. At the Entertainment (Swansea only),
Providence Place Mall 16, and Showcase cinemas.
Issue Date: November 29 - December 5, 2002
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