Introduction

This is a post that is a repurposing of an old-school Mini-Review Round-Up post. As stated here I am essentially done with running multi-film review posts. Each film deserves its own review. Therefore I will repost, and at times add to, old reviews periodically. Enjoy!

Shadow People

I could probably write a much longer piece on this film. One thing it does fairly successfully is mash feature and documentary techniques together. It fully commits to the this “inspired by real events.” The subject matter (Seeing malevolent shadows that would kill you in your sleep if you know they exist) is very strong. This commitment to approach, and the scoring help driving home despite missteps in the approach on occasion and casting issues. A testament to it’s efficacy is that it still was unsettling even in spite of nagging doubts about the quick escalation of the investigation of the phenomena and the fact that much of the second into the third act is spent crystallizing the modus operandi of these beings. Some aspects work brilliantly, for example, it’s a shame I watched it on TV because it was trying deft, slight scares at time that would read better in a theater, some facets of the myth aren’t quite as strong as the others, however, it’s a fascinating one.

Granted the bones of it do have a source in popular culture but its impact on the cinematic realm, as far as I know, is fairly small at current. What one can say is that this film is not unlike The Curse with better production values that’s slightly less clear on its own rules – in short, it excels in spite of itself. Taking that into account, and owing to how it made my skin crawl, I can give it a…

8/10…

despite my reservations.