The Forest

GENERAL INFORMATION

Release Info: 8 January 2016

Director: XX
Writer: XX
Running Time: 93 Minutes

Staring:  Natalie Dormer, Eoin Macken, Stephanie Vogt

Rating? PG-13

SPOILERS? NO

REVIEWS

IMDB: 5 of 10

MY RATING: 5

STORYLINE

A woman goes into Japan's Suicide Forest to find her twin sister, and confronts supernatural terror.

MY REVIEW

I do want to mention first that I did go into this movie with an open mind. I have read many articles about the Aokigahara Forest at the base of Mount Fuji, known as the Suicide Forest and find the whole idea interesting and heart breaking. RTHe movie, The Forest focuses on Game of Thrones star Natalie Dormer in a dual role as twins Jess and Sara. Jess has disappeared into the forest, and Sara travels to Japan to go into the forest to look for her, unaware of the demons that lurk in the forest. In the 2014 movie, As Above, So Below took an intrinsically creepy setting, the Paris catacombs, and used an unsettling atmosphere and good scares to make another tragic film. 

What I DID LIKE about this movie:

• Actual Atmosphere. The score is fitting and does great assistance with the too-easy scares (I'll talk about that in a minute). I do love the way the forest was portrayed as quite nearly a character in it’s own right but it mostly squanders its promise by degrading it to a hot spot for cheap jump scares.
• The Japanese Mythos alone was enough to hold together a story that could easily have been dotted with Japanese demons and historical significance.

What I DID NOT LIKE about this movie:

• Forced Storytelling- This feels to me that the prime example where instead of the story gently letting you understand for yourself, it takes it's little devil hands and pulls your mouth open and force the story down your throat. They tried not to let you forget that THEY were telling this story and you better listen! The film has a pretty interesting premise and could have worked if executed correctly. 
• Literal Atmosphere- This movie does not use the forest setting to its advantage. Any atmosphere created by the forest is frittered away by a dull jump scare, that are really just boring. That could have been helped by a good story, but once Sara actually reaches the forest, the plot just sort of stops. 
• The Story Itself- Wow, this puppy takes a lot to get started! This goes back to the Forced storytelling mentioned above. They just spend too much time telling the story instead of letting the film tell its own story. The last half of the movie is just her running through the forest while demons pop out from behind the trees. It's not until the end that the plot decides to move forward any more, but by the time the big twist happens, you don't really care. The Forest has a committed performance from Natalie Dormer and glimmers of an interesting movie but mostly wastes them on predictable jump scares and a bland story.

On a more personal note..... First picture is what I came into the office to see laying in the window.. Dexter and Boomer. I love these two little boys! (Dex is about 6 months old and Boomer is almost 8 years old. Then, I took a selfie. And look how adorable my Isabella is!! Last but not least, Dexter sitting in the window...