The Babadook (2014)★★★★☆

The Babadook was all I heard about in horror movies for months last year, and worried it wouldn’t live up to its hype, I decided not to watch it until that hype had died down somewhat.

Well, I finally watched it! And I was pleasantly surprised to find that the movie started out strong and stayed strong throughout.

It was extremely well paced for a horror movie, which kept my (frequently short) attention span happy. The acting was superb, which is impressive considering that Noah Wiseman (Samuel) was only 7 at the time. It was refreshing to see, since I don’t often find truly believable child actors (especially in horror movies).

I thought the use of background music was understated and well placed. The story itself was also well done — it’s a horror that’s simultaneously every mother’s and every child’s worst nightmare. And that scene in the kitchen with the tooth…not for the faint of heart.

It did lose me a little at the end… The “twist” ending seemed a bit out of place, but ultimately wasn’t too distracting since my belief had already been well suspended by the rest of the film, so I stayed engaged if a bit quizzical. All in all, it’s a movie I recommend if you’re into something scary and supernatural, but not overly gory.