Watched the horror (maybe horror comedy) film We Summon the Darkness which is new to Netflix this week. I say maybe comedy because there’s a chance it’s meant to be a dark comedy… but I’m not sure if any of the attempts at sadistic humor are intentional. Not “so bad its funny” but more… is this supposed to be funny or completely serious? Because the tone is mixed.
We Summon the Darkness is set in the late 1980s during a rash of satanic murders across the country. A trio of girls are on a road trip to see a heavy metal show when they run across three equally metal dudes in a van. They hang out and wind up at one of their father’s mansions. And then the satanic murders start.
It’s a minor spoiler but there’s a twist that is kind of ruined by the title of the movie. You can see it coming a mile away… but that’s made slightly more palatable because there’s a second twist that comes so close on the heals of the first. It might as well be the same twist and probably would have been smarter to spread them to give this saggy movie some extra life.
Because, yeah, this movie just isn’t good enough. As a horror movie, it’s not very scary. As a suspense thriller, the suspense is just a little too sloggy. As a, I dunno, dark comedy, it’s not consistently trying to make those awkward, sadistic laughs (if it’s even trying). It’s just kind of a wet noodle of a movie with a twist that’s a little too obvious. I can’t say that I was exactly bored, to be fair. I just kept waiting for any of the elements of the flick to really kick in… and they never did.
So, yeah, I don’t think I’d recommend this movie to anyone. It’s not good enough (or bad enough) at anything it does leaving it just kind of nowhere.
Score: 70