An Online Idea becomes real (The Slender Man, 2018)

Introduction

I'm something of a fan of myths and legends myself and the Slender Man is probably one of the most popular urban myths of our generation. I know that there have been some documentaries and short films on the subject but I heard about this one back in 2021. The movie was released in 2018 and I just got to know about it three years later. So yeah, I was kind of excited but I know how bad movie adaptations tend to get so I didn't get my hopes too high. Well, let's get into the review.

Synopsis

Four girls decide to summon Slender Man after hearing about the myth. After the process, the friends think nothing of the idea. However, as they start to experience strange things, they soon realize that the Slender Man idea is much more than what they thought.

Will the girls be able to beat the Slender Man?

Context

Genre: Horror Release Date: August 2018 Screen time: 1hr 33 minutes

Four friends, Wren, Hallie, Chloe and Katie, are having a sleepover at Katie's house on a regular night. They hear about the Slender Man and start to ask questions. Surfing the net, they learn about the mysterious figure and find out how to summon him through a video. Thinking nothing of it, they follow the steps to summon the Slender man just like any other group of curious teens would have done.

After the teens had completed the summoning, nothing really happened so they resumed their evening as planned. The following days they try to live their lives normally but that was not going to be the case. They start to experience strange things even having nightmares of the video they watched about the Slender Man. When one of them disappears, the girls begin to question all logic and start to wonder if there was more to the Slender Man idea.

The remaining girls investigate the disappearance of their friend. They discover different cases and evidences of the Slender Man's existence. To stop him, the girls need to have the courage to make certain sacrifices. Very quickly, they realize that their lives and the lives of their loved ones are in danger as they face the biggest battles of their lives.

Observations and my opinion (Watch or Pass?)

1. A bad Adaptation: The movie tried to depict the fact that the Slender Man spreads like a viral bad joke on the internet and he can't be stopped. Still, a lot of things are still unclear. For example, I really still don't understand how the summoning works. To make the movie fuller I think the producers added a lot of stuff because there are things that were just unexplained and annoying that made the movie kind of noisy. They even included some of the original memes but it just didn't go so well.

2. Special effects: The special effects were ok but not the best. You could not see through the effects but you would feel like it could have been better.

3. It just wasn't that scary: True horror movies fans might agree. The idea of the Slender Man is scary but the movie just was not very scary. At some point, like I said, it was annoying. At other parts it was something to laugh at.

The Verdict

If you want to see a horror movie, I wouldn't recommend this one. The movie isn't that bad but it also isn't that good. I'd classify it as a Maybe.

Characters and their actors

Best Act

Joey King

Joey, the kissing booth girl, did pretty well in this movie. She played the part of Wren, the girl that fully believed that the Slender Man was real. Her reactions on the existence of the Slender Man was pleasant to watch. She packed a lot of emotions and life into the Wren character.

Worst Act

Julia Goldani Telles

She played the character of Hallie, the last girl to believe that the Slender Man existed. She was not so bad but compared to the rest, she wasn't that good. The actress of Hallie's mum was way worse but I like to highlight major characters.

Other actors include;

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Movie Trailer

Conclusion

The Slender Man idea was a promising one when it came up years ago. The movie, however, was not able to live up to the urban myth in my opinion.

I really love the horror genre so I will definitely cover some more horror films in the future.