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| Release: 2009, Rating: PG-13, Runtime: 92 min. |
The Hole reminds me of a time when I watched horror movies and I was way too young for them. For example, I’m sure everyone saw Gremlins as a kid, but when you think about it, that movie was way too mature for kids, yet we all saw it anyway. That’s pretty much The Hole in a nutshell, a movie that seems like it’s geared towards kids, but shouldn’t be watched by them, as it has some scary scenes and a little bit of gore. I’m not a kid however, so what did I think? Read on to find out…
Short nitty-gritty plot description from IMDb is as follows: A pair of brothers stumble upon a mysterious hole in their basement that leads to the darkest corridors of their fears and nightmares.
The Hole is about a, you guessed it, hole. A new family has just recently moved to a town and while one day messing around in the basement of their new house, the two brothers, Dane and Lucas, find a locked door in the floor. They decide to open the door and discover what looks to be a bottomless pit. Little do they know, the pit is a gateway, that leads to the kids worst fears coming to reality.
The Hole really does remind me of the type of teenagers in peril horror movies of the 80s. Hell, it even kinda reminds me of The Goonies, with the mini adventures these kids go through. Maybe it has to do with the fact that Joe Dante, director of Gremlins, directed this movie. Joe Dante gives us a movie that for the most part, plays it light, with the kids goofing around, even when a ton a spooky stuff starts happening. Yet, near the end of the movie, it starts to go into more of a full tilt horror mode and there are some genuinely spooky scenes to be had.
I especially loved the fair use of stop motion animation for one scene in particular, which I won’t spoil here and the ending, another thing I won’t spoil, provides an ample amount of stylistic imagery, echoing how big everything can look to a kid. It does seem like a fair amount of the budget went into that ending and it shows. There is however, a few slow scenes leading up the ending, which unfortunately, will have you checking your watch a few times. This isn’t a movie chalk full of scares and plot forward movement.
Overall, I enjoyed The Hole. Any movie that can capture even a little bit of my childhood memories of watching old 80s horror films, is a-okay in my book. It doesn’t reach the magical heights of those same movies I mentioned above and will probably be easily forgotten by most, but if you happen to come across it and want to have a good time, I recommend The Hole easily.
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