Movie Review: The Dark

Posted by Traci on July 29, 2006 in Cinema, Reviews | ∞

The 2005 release “The Dark” came to video in April of 2006. It stars Sean Bean (Lord Of The Rings, Flightplan, Silent Hill) as James and Maria Bello (The Cooler, Secret Window, A History Of Violence) as Adele, as a seperated couple trying to raise their daughter Sarah while living on two seperate continents.

The story starts out with Sarah, played by relative newcomer Sophie Stuckey, demanding that her mother take her from their home in New York to visit her dad who is living on the Welsh coast. Sarah and Adele soon find that the history of the area is one that has been steeped in the legend of Annwn, the Welsh version of the otherworld, where you can get back loved ones when they die if you find the way. When Sarah drowns while taking a walk along the coast in the same area as a fanatical bunch of believers took their lives some 50 years before, Adele and James meet Ebrill (played by Abigail Stone) who tells them that she can be their daughter instead of Sarah. After researching the history of the area, Adele finds that Ebrill is not what she seems and takes on the journey of trying to retrieve her own daughter.

The end left me satisfied and somewhat happily suprised that it had some interesting plot twists,(as well as having some Silent Hill undertones to it). Why this movie was allowed to fly under the radar amongst all of 2005 box office crap is beyond me. It is one that is well written, acted and directed. The scenery of the Welsh coastline is breathtaking if you’re someone who gets into that sort of thing. Both Maria Bello who is the main character in the film and Sean Bean who is unfortunately drastically underused bring their high quality acting to this little film. That in itself is enough for me to take a look at least once and quite possibly reason to put it in my DVD collection for rainy nights when I need a little creepy suspense.