Lovely little movie right here, presenting a story rarely used, with a way better execution and quite good actors.

Stephen McHattie does it again, comes in and steals the show as a dark, mysterious man, just like he did in Haunter (2013). Teaming up with Enrico Colantoni, you can be sure to have at least a A- acting style. The plot itself is lovely to watch, if your eyes are set on the horror industry of course, and if you are able to appreciate smaller productions, do yourself a favor and find this one.

The visuals are beautiful, the story goes on at a good pace, the reveal is nice but the ending feels forced. Quick and easy, perhaps some more time was needed on the climax, but nevertheless I took the film for what it was, a nice change of direction, pace, and a different way to tell a horror story. I will definitely recommend this one.

Cheers!

Leah (Katie Findlay) blames herself for her mother's suicide. In a constant dysfunctional melancholy, she starts to draw a graphic novel, which symbolically imitates her life and is ominous. The villain of the story is "The Dark Stranger." Findlay was able to pull off the quiet and moody teen, so much so that at 20 minutes into the film, she was irritating me. About that time the film changes gears slightly. The film takes time to build characters and the family relationship, much like a Lifetime feature. I can see this movie having an appeal to dark graphic novel fans such as "Slenderman." The film lets itself open to a sequel or even a TV series. Horror is mostly psychological. The production will be tame to those who demand blood and guts or Hitchcock.in their terror.

Guide: No swearing, sex, or nudity.

This movie tells the tale of a highly troubled teen who suffers from chronic hallucinations. Whether those hallucinations are the product of her traumatic past or a curse is not really clear. Apart from the fact that the protagonist has a hard time distinguishing reality from fantasy she also seems to suffer from agoraphobia (which is the clinical term for someone who is afraid of the outside world).

What really irked me about the movie were the totally random "2D dream sequences/daydreams" which if I had to guess were supposed to add some sort of artistic element. Kind of a given choice considering how the movie is about an artist but not quite solid in it's execution. It ended up being really silly. After all this is supposed to be a Horror movie and not a children's playbook.

Furthermore, the antagonist of the movie (the dark stranger) is basically an old man who is blackfacing/grayfacing. I know, this is supposed to be a scary movie but when I first saw the "dark stranger" I laughed out loud. It just seemed way too bizarre.

To conclude: Was the movie scary? No, not really.