They (2002)

Director:

Robert Harmon

Writer (WGA):

Brendan Hood (written by)

Release Date:

27 November 2002 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Thriller

Tagline:

Are you afraid of the dark? You should be.

Plot:

After witnessing a horrific and traumatic event, Julia Lund, a graduate student in psychology, gradually...

Plot Keywords:

Nightmare | Suicide | Darkness | Creature | Alternate Dimension

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

Laura Regan	...	Julia Lund
Marc Blucas	...	Paul Loomis
Ethan Embry	...	Sam Burnside
Dagmara Dominczyk	...	Terry Alba
Jon Abrahams	...	Billy Parks
Alexander Gould	...	Young Billy
Desiree Zurowski	...	Mary Parks
Mark Hildreth	...	Troy
Jonathan Cherry	...	Darren
Peter LaCroix	...	David Parks (as Peter Lacroix)
Jessica Amlee	...	Young Julia
Jay Brazeau	...	Dr. Booth
L. Harvey Gold	...	Professor Crowley
David Abbott	...	Professor Adkins
Jodelle Ferland	...	Sarah (as Jodelle Micah Ferland)

Also Known As:

Wes Craven Presents: They (USA) (complete title)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for terror/violence, sexual content and language.

Runtime:

89 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Mexico:B15 | Iceland:16 | Australia:M | France:-12 | Germany:16 | Netherlands:12 | New Zealand:M | Philippines:PG-13 | Singapore:PG | UK:15 | USA:PG-13 | Finland:K-11 | Canada:PG (Ontario)

Filming Locations:

Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada

Company:

Dimension Films

Trivia:

Though Brendan Hood is credited as screenwriter, he only came up with the basic idea. Everything in his original draft was subsequently written out by the producers, and it's estimated that up to 10 people have worked on the script.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Julia's car stalls on the road, she is shown sitting in the car wearing a seatbelt. After she reaches into the glove compartment and pulls out a flashlight she is no longer wearing the seatbelt.

Quotes:

Terry: Or that he was afraid of the dark.
Julia Lund: I know that feeling.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Film Geek (2005)

Soundtrack:

Standing on the Edge of Summer

Imaginary creatures who live in the dark come to get their victims.

This film has it's good and bad sides. There's a lot of potential and beautiful scenes in this movie. I don't know how they managed to find that country scene with mists, the moon, a country road and everything just perfect!

It also succeeds in scaring the viewer quite a few times with startling attacks and creepy camera work. I would even have liked to see more of this, but true, it might become repetitive, and we know how how we hate repetitive stuff in the world of the short attention span! Also sound is used to scare, like the telephone ringing in the 'Exorcist', at a tense moment.

It also slightly over uses the "monster coming to get the camera" scene, where a scary monster comes at the camera (/viewer). These are good methods of scaring people.

There are some terrible logic errors and they do spoil the film for 'thinking' people. If it was a real scenario her boyfriend, for example, wouldn't let her out of his sight! Much of the plot relies on the people isolating themselves from others for anything to take place. The strange thing is, even though they know they are in danger, they still go off on their own, where no one is there to help them. Whenever there are people present, nothing happens.

This flaw ruined the film a bit for me. I kept thinking "why is she doing THAT", when nothing would happen if she did THIS. Very frustrating... but I guess they were out to make a movie about people being attacked when they were alone, and this is what they ended up with. (The British "Lenny Henry Show" did a great parody of this kind of movie, with the actors always saying: "We've got to split up, it's more likely we get chopped up that way!" and "oh-oh, the music's changed, that must mean - here comes the bad guy!")

Also, without spoiling anything, there are some places where people just seem to willingly ignore the facts. Like when a window is broken -inwards-, into a closed chamber. No one even noticed that, and one is left asking - and then what? Just another missing person from a locked room? How many of these can there be? Where are the paranormal investigators when you need them? Where are the university geeks want to become the "ghost busters"? They investigated stuff like this in "The Entity" and that was supposed to be based on a true story.

Coming back to the positive side, I can imagine the actress playing the main part was chosen because she bears a striking resemblance to a young Mia Farrow in "Rosemary's Baby". Those types are always believable when scared to death. One seems to identify with a skinny (almost anorexic (was that possibly the comment they were making with her vomiting in the railways station?) sweet young thing. Her boyfriend is far too conservative for his own good. Letting her sleep alone in a double bed! What kind of gentleman is that, in this day and age! Just think: If her impotent shrink had been played by Bruce Willis he'd have followed up on her story and we'd have seen some aliens splattered all over the subway! - Now that'd been juicy! Sorry wrong film. That's "Mimic".

"They" is one of these movies that end up being rather annoying the more you see it. From all sides... and I agree there was a LOT of potential in there. Just not quite enough attention to detail.

Still: *** /5