Darkness Falls

This film is dreadful, on every count; writing, directing, acting, and special effects. How could anybody spend money to make this trash? How would anybody dare to take money for participating in this trash? I would like to throw in a few spoilers to fill out this review but it is pointless. Nothing additional I might say could ever ruin this mess anymore than the people responsible for it have done from start to finish..

I thought I was in for a good movie as this started out really well. The way the serial killers plotted out their murders to be a close to perfect crime was a great premise. The cold reality of it reminded me of "Henry: Portrait of a serial killer". Then the movie sinks faster than a rock in a lake. As soon as the detective went into "think like the killers" mode, it got stupid. Then he makes so many bad decisions that don't make sense, which ends up getting more innocent people killed. This movie could have been good, but the writer got in the way with some unplausible stupid ideas. The ending was just as bad and didn't make sense. The big emotional moment in the end was meaningless. This is a good example of how NOT to make a movie. Pure stupidity.

Were they trolling when they released this film? The timing of the music and volume was off throughout the movie. The shot of him after arguing with his boss in his apartment was shaky and too close and just weird? Why did they wait so long to introduce the audience to the fact that the protagonist's wife was an important person? Why did the captain argue after telling the main character he was right? What was she so angry about? Why was the mother's little speech in the park so unnatural? Why wasn't there more explanation about how a list of potential witnesses was developed? Where did the name of the movie come from? It was never referenced in the movie. This movie was absolute trash. I've never been so angry about a film I've watched in my life. I would have been better off clicking on YouTube watching a little kid toy review.

A bad plot drowned out by an even worse soundtrack. A complete waste of good actors.

The plot tries to be original but is unbelievable. Gary Cole is a very capable actor at playing a villain...but the direction has him trying to hard. Shawn Ashmore is from the Mark Walberg school of acting....and has two faces, stoic blank look and frowning screaming face that is artificially used to show emotion. Again, trying too hard to be a tortured widower cop and instead coming off like a constipated face screaming teenage brat. Editing tries to hard. In some places it is skipping around causing the audience to play catch-up to what scene is being displayed, in other places it lags way too long (like opening sequence which should have been 45 seconds but last seven minutes. It feels like there could have been a better movie, but director overplays his hand and forces tension and suspense instead of allowing it to happen naturally with a better writing. Another big thing....it is hard to empathize with a character's loss when the audience NEVER sees how life was before the loss.

I am a tad puzzled by low scores, giving it one or two stars is simply not fair. The movie is more than competently made, some good camera work, decent acting and enthusiastic score. Granted, it does have shortcomings, holes in the story line, slips here and there, but it never feels unwatchable. Eve more so, I find it to be perfect for late night watching that does not require full attention. Solid 5/10 and, as a top 1K, I stick to it.

In the opening scene, Elizabeth is murdered and made to look like suicide. Her husband is Jeff (Shawn Ashmore) a detective on the LA police force. He is obsessed with the idea it was murder and is out to find the killers. There is a rash of similar suicides in LA. The plot was rather haphazard and lazy. I thought Daniella Alonso gave a good performance as his boss, a substitute for the typically obese black man who swears and yells unintelligible words. No swagger. Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity.

This is one of the worst made movies I've ever seen. If you like REALLY SLOW movies, try to watch this. I couldn't.

Started slow and built to the end. Had me at the edge of my seat throughout. I loved the ending.

Good to see the venerable Gary Cole doing his stuff again but even he fails to raise this rather pedestrian movie with overblown soundtrack and some truly dismal acting above a mediocre 4/10 and that is being generous. If you are in Covid lockdown with nothing to do it will suffice as a wet Sunday afternoon diversion but there is nothing new here, it is a bit like an episode of CSI or any other cop show on tv.