Is this a review? Yes and no. I’m sort of tired of writing a typical review, so I’ll do this one a little differently. Have you heard of the movie The Dark And The Wicked? No?? Hmmmm. Do you have Shudder? Oh, you do?? Well…..get your happy ass on over there and watch the movie! That was a bit rude. My apologies.

Ok, so the movie is The Dark And The Wicked. Written and directed by Bryan Bertino, who also wrote and directed The Strangers (a personal favorite of mine btw). So what does this movie have going for it: Good acting? Check. Creepy atmosphere? Check. Jump scares? Yeah, a minimal check. A woman slicing off her fingers thinking that they’re carrots? Super check!

The Dark And The Wicked doesn’t exactly reinvent anything horror-wise, but aside from the ending – it doesn’t really fuck anything up. The story is fairly straight forward: Two siblings (Marin Ireland and Michael Abbott Jr.) return home to be with their dying father and distraught mother. While there, strange things start happening – disturbing images pop up – and blood is shed. Not all exactly in that order. There’s a sense of sorrow and dread throughout the whole movie, and it definitely plays on general grief and emotion that a family goes through when someone either passes away, or is about to.

This is one of those movies that I had low expectations with, and ended up liking it more because of that. While not perfect, The Dark And The Wicked did its job with me…..which is basically making me squirm a few times and maybe even giving in to the ‘jump scare’ attempts. It’s on Shudder now, so goooooooo watch it!