The latest Stephen King short story adapted into a feature film is the movie The Boogeyman, a horror film directed by Rob Savage.

According to IMSB, “Still reeling from the tragic death of their mother, a teenage girl and her younger sister find themselves plagued by a sadistic presence in their house and struggle to get their grieving father to pay attention before it’s too late.“

Sadie (Sophie Thatcher) is a solid lead character, bring both a competence and a serious troubled backstory. The death of her mother in a car wreck shaped her as a character dramatically, but not as much as it did her father, Will (Chris Messina). Will, a therapist who worked out of his home, had major grief going on with the loss of his wife. So much so that it was affecting how he was parenting. I found myself yelling at Will during the scene where Sadie wanted to talk to him about her feelings of her mother’s death, but he avoided it like crazy. I found that to be just horribly selfish of him.

The film does a really good job of keeping the mystery of what the Boogeyman looked like for most of the movie, allowing the suspense to grow with every shadowy glance. Some horror movies jump right into full screen shots of the monsters and it becomes less frightening. Not so here. The Boogeyman was scary through the entire film and when we finally get a really extended look at it, it makes it more effective.

There were plenty of times where I found myself ready to yell (I was in the theater so I was yelling to myself) about things that the characters were doing or were not doing. I don’t know if it is my geeky background or my knowledge of comic books and roleplaying, but there are things that seem obvious to do instead of some of the things that they tried. However, one of the big things from the third act, I had picked out well before and was yelling (to myself) that they needed to do it. When they actually did what I wanted and it worked, I nearly jumped out of my seat.

Vivien Lyra Blair played Sadie’s little sister Sawyer, and she does a very solid job. She had several facials that showed plenty of the differing emotions that a young girl her age would be thinking during this entire movie. There was also a winning cameo from David Dastmalchian that kicks the film off wonderfully.

The film may not be the best horror film ever made, but it succeeded in keeping me invested and tense with these characters. I was on the edge of my seat for most of the movie so I found it to be a good time.

4 stars