Eight-year-old Sally Farnham (Bailee Madison) has recently moved to Rhode Island to live with her estranged father Alex (Guy Pearce) and his girlfriend Kim (Katie Holmes) while they restore the ancient Blackwood Manor for resale. Even though Alex and Kim try to make her feel welcome, all she wants to do is to go back to her old home with her mother. One morning, while exploring Blackwood's extensive grounds, Sally discovers a hidden chamber accidentally frees a tribe of pixie-like creatures. It is only afterwards, however, that she realizes that they want to kidnap her and bring her to their warren under the manor. Her father refuses to believe that she is telling the truth, leaving her to defend against these nocturnal invaders on her own.
Though not an altogether inaccurate label, I would hesitate to advertise Don't Be Afraid of the Dark as a horror film. Doing so creates an inaccurate set of expectations in the viewer (similar to my opinion of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or The Last House on the Left). Between its whispered threats and murine antagonists, it is intimately more creepy than terrifying. It could be more appropriately described as a melancholic meditation of the effects of a broken home on a too-often overlooked child.
To this end, the film is structured less like a modern horror film than it is a Greek tragedy. The imps in the house are only a threat to Sally, whose most formidable weapons are a night light and a Polaroid camera. Though he was capable of stopping the imps' assault throughout the film, Alex is too preoccupied with his work to take even the slightest notice of the danger that his family is in. By neglecting Sally's need for companionship when she first arrived, he opened her to the tempting offers of friendship that the imps promised her in exchange for releasing them. By refusing to believe Sally's increasing visible fears, he placed all three of them perpetual danger. By refusing to leave the house when even Kim was begging him to, he ensured that the creatures would tear his family apart. Although Alex himself survives the ordeal, he is burdened with the guilt of knowing that his constant inaction directly resulted in the film's tragic climax.
By starring a girl who was only eight-years-old at the time that filming began, director Troy Nixey and writer / producer Guillermo del Toro took a considerable risk with the emotional core of the film. The old Hollywood adage, "never work with animals and children," is a direct warning against making this exact kind of child-centric film. The quality of child actors is notoriously unpredictable, running the gamut from Daniel Radcliffe to Jake Lloyd. "Not terrible" is often the best that anybody can expect.
Bailee Madison, however, gave a rare and moving performance as the haunted Sally Farnham. Her character is surprisingly complex, torn between her instinctual need for her father's protection and her aversion toward a man who is essentially a complete stranger to her. Madison's performance captures every nuance of a girl forced into a broken family. She conveys the sour resentment of being uprooted from a reasonably stable home, the giddy wonder of a girl discovering strange new "friends" and the desperate need to be believed. Amidst a solid-but-forgettable cast, she succeeds at giving a truly exceptional performance.
On the whole, Don't Be Afraid of the Dark is a solidly entertaining and reasonably executed horror film. Becky and I agree that this film is a solid 7, comparing favorably to Alien, Carrie and E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial.
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