Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (2011) - 3 stars out of 10

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (2011) - 3 stars out of 10

I don't understand how a movie whose trailer looked so incredible could end up being completely lackluster.  "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark" misses its mark, replacing psychological chills with CGI fairies.  After seeing the trailer where Sally is crawling under the covers and the creature jumps out at her, this film jumped to the top of my "must see" list... but even when that scene occured in the movie, they overdid it with CGI and it was no good.  This whole film is completely unlike Guillermo del Toro and I pray that he isn't suffering from "M. Night syndrome."  It's tough to pinpoint why, but the whole thing is just poorly done.  Guy Pearce and Katie Holmes are talented actors but they can't do much with what they're given in this instance.  A little girl being terrorized in a horror film is integral to the audience's fear in that we fear for her, but in this case, I couldn't have cared less what happened to her.  Bailee Madison's performance is just very off-putting.  As far as a supernatural horror film's villain, less is generally more as our imaginations fill in the horrific details.  This film takes the opposite approach, leaving little to the imagination.  The opening sequence has so much potential, with these creepy voices from the fireplace driving a character to madness, but they show the source of the voices early on and it's a progressive downward spiral from there.  The concept of the film is good, the story develops well, the ending leave you thinking, but the execution is just bad.  The movie has its moments, like the opening sequence and the bathtub scene, but these filmmakers need to take a lesson from classic horror films.  Keep us in suspense and don't show us the villain too soon - we think that we want to see every detail but we are wrong and so were the filmmakers of "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark."