interesting start/lame ending

Rating: 5/10 (6 May 2020)

This film starts out strong (creepy, interesting), begins to struggle-and-flail in the middle, and totally tanks in the end. we have two seemingly intelligent people who are so disconnected from their lives, each other and their jobs as parents that they are completely unaware of the degree of danger to their family by staying in that home (despite seeing evidence all around and in their children's behavior), and fail to protect them.
i mean they can't even properly light their home despite the menace that surrounds them lol. they were literally in the dark. (i took the poor lighting as the film maker's lazy attempt at "forcing the mood" of a chilling horror movie but in fact it was just frustratingly odd and distractingly annoying.)
the sloppy ending is a complete (and nonsensical) betrayal of the film's earlier promise and the strong rating on imdb is less a reflection of the film's "strength" and more an indication of how intellectually and cinematically deprived horror fans have become as a result of the dearth of truly scary horror films.
the acting is okay but for me the highlight of this movie are the non-diegetic needle-on-record and other muffled sound effects. those definitely added to the scary mood.
5/10