AFRAID OF THE DARK
Not bad, but sloooooow goin'
Man, I hope you like a whole lot of "eyesight" symbolism.
Ben Keyworth stars as Lucas, a young English boy with steadily degenerating eyesight who hangs out with his pregnant mother and a whole lotta blind people. There're some cranky bastard out there slashing up these blind people (this doesn't sound like much of a challenge for him), but he's thwarted soon enough by the kid. But that's when the real trouble starts.
Except for the incessant, beat-you-over-the-head sight metaphors, this is a very quiet, creepy little movie that caught me a little off guard. Keyworth's performance is quite good; very much underplayed but not often seeming like one of those "he's crazy because he's a loner" people. Everybody else in the cast is quite good, though nobody stands out.
The movie's slow pace may well put off many viewers; I don't think "slow pace" quite does justice to how sluggish this movie is, but there are rewards for the patient. Maybe not enough to justify the viewing; it's not really all that memorable overall, but it does have its moments.
Directed and co-written by Mark Peploe, who wrote The Last Emperor, if that's any suggestion of the movie's eventfulness for you.