Creepy kids appear in a lot of horror movies. There's something about seeing little kids who are supposed to be sweet and innocent do horrifying things that intrigues filmmakers and moviegoers. I love kids, but I also know how they can be sometimes, so i tend to like movies that feature weird little kids who may or may not be evil, and this one definitely looks interesting.
This movie starts with a little girl who is inexplicably alone in a big house and we don't know why. She does normal kid things, like talking to her stuffed animals and making food while narrowly avoiding getting hurt several times, which is hard to watch. There's an air of mystery surrounding the events of the movie, since we don't know who the girl is or why she's alone. Plus there are weird things happening, doors opening by themselves and strange noises. It's a strange and confusing set of events.
The main actress plays her part well and makes us care about her, but since we don't know what's going on or how reliable she is as a narrator, the movie is frustrating in that way. It's unclear if she's crazy or evil, or just a poor normal kid in the middle of a bad situation, so there is a lot of suspense surrounding her actions. She seems lonely and misses her family, but since we don't know what happened to them, it's hard to know whether to feel sorry for her or be afraid of her.
It's difficult to make a movie like this successfully, since the main actress has to be good enough to carry pretty much the whole movie on her shoulders, but Shree Crooks, who plays the little girl Stephanie who is the main character in this movie, does a good job. I felt for her even while I was kinda terrified of her, so I'm impressed with her acting skills. Once the story starts to unfold and more details are revealed, it just seems like the more we know the more confusing everything gets, which is good I guess, because it does keep the movie interesting, but it can also be very frustrating. Obviously the events of this movie prove that you can't trust adults any more than you can kids.
Eventually the movie does finally clue us into what's really going on, and it is scary as hell, at least for me. Like I said, the lead actress has to put in a kick-ass performance to pull this kind of movie off, and she really does. I also like Anna Torv and Frank Grillo, the actors who play Stephanie's parents. Anna Torv was also in the show "Fringe," so we know she can handle freaky, mysterious happenings. I do kind of wish the movie had left more to the imagination at the end instead of repeating the same thing over and over (we get it, we got it a long time ago, shut up) but these are small quibbles. Overall the movie is very enjoyable.
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