Tag: movie review

Part 3 of My “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” Review/Ramble

So let’s hop right back in. Chuck has just disappeared into thin air, and the whole time he was being chased down by this water-logged, black haired, glob of a creature, Ramon and Stella have been reading. They watched Chuck’s story actively being written, knowing that meant he was being killed (?), and yet they didn’t show up until right after he disappeared.

Now it’s just Ramon and Stella and everything looks pretty bleak. However, while Chuck was going through it, Ramon and Stella were doing research about Sarah Bellows (aka, reading through her medical records) and they found out about the abuse she had faced from her entire family. Sarah had a relative who worked at the mental hospital where she was institutionalized and would use his position of power to manipulate and gaslight her. It’s believed she killed him, and many other of her family members, though Stella believes that means that Sarah wrote stories about them and then the bad things happened (rather than Sarah commiting the violent acts herself). 

Ramon and Stella end up getting arrested for breaking into the hospital. Stella calls her dad from jail, and it’s actually a really emotional and sweet scene. She basically tells him that she’s afraid she’s going to die or go missing and that if she does, she wants him to know that she loves him. Then the evil police officer shows up to harass Ramon for skipping the draft and tell Stella she’s free to leave. Stella tries to explain that everything going on is because of Sarah Bellows and her magic book, but the evil cop couldn’t care less. He locks Ramon and Stella in separate cells for the night. Ramon and Stella have a sweet moment, but I don’t care to harp on that arc too much. 

Anyways, Stella left Sarah Bellows’ book on the cop’s desk and he (the cop) notices that a new story starts being written in it. He asks if Ramon and Stella are somehow writing it, but of course they aren’t. When they hear a new story is being written, they freak out and insist they’re gonna die, but the cop is too dumb to care. This story is about Ramon, and he recognizes that pretty quickly because he recognizes the monster that’s coming after them. This is the Jangly man, easily one of the most terrifying monsters in this whole movie in my opinion. The cop thinks he can just shoot it, but obviously it’s not that easy. Ramon and Stella manage to get free from the cells while the evil cop battles the Jangly man. This next part is blurry but I believe Ramon hijacks a police car to try and drive away from the Jangly man, while Stella takes the book and runs back to the Bellows house. 

Once at the Bellows house, it’s almost like Stella enters a time loop (similar to what happened to Chuck in the closet scene) because everything is restored to its original condition from all those years ago. There are ghosts/visions (??) of the Bellows family running around the house- The mother is yelling about how Sarah got out and the boys need to go find her and bring her back. Except, they find Stella and believe she is Sarah, so they take her and lock her down in the basement. This is where Stella and Sarah finally meet, and Stella confronts her about how she’s becoming the monster that everyone accuses her of being. Then Stella gets Sarah’s magic pen that writes with blood (her own blood) and Stella rewrites Sarah’s history so that she can be remembered in a more honest and forgiving way, rather than blamed to be a monster as most people choose to view her as. Then the house rumbles and shifts and Stella’s back in the present timeline. She finds Ramon and they rejoice, even though their friends are dead/missing.

The movie ends with the reveal that Stella has been writing all of this as a memoir of sorts- another one of her stories, though it is a true one. She mentions that Auggie and Chuck are still missing, but implies a sequel by hinting that she plans on getting them back. The very end of the movie, which is my favorite scene by far, reveals that Stella and her dad broke Ruth out of the mental hospital and they all drive off into the sunset. Also Ramon goes to Vietnam, but that felt like an afterthought. Anyways, roll credits. 

OKAY. So let’s get into how I think the sequel should be handled. I think the ending of the movie itself sets up some pretty concrete ideas for a second movie. We have a new magical object; a pen that writes with blood and can write or rewrite history. We have the same main character, Stella, but she’s grown as a person and has a new side character, Ruth. We still have the social/political side plot of the war and everything else going on in the late 60s, early 70s, and with two female leads, we could have a lot of interesting conversations about feminism in the B-plot. 

The main conflict is pretty obvious; we gotta get Chuck and Auggie back. I imagine they’re gonna be pretty traumatized from their stories and this second movie would have a perfect opportunity to tackle themes of PTSD and trauma. Auggie’s story had a lot to do with food and then he ended up getting pulled away from under his bed, so I could imagine him developing disordered eating habits and possibly a fear of something being under his bed. Chuck clearly developed a fear of red, specifically red rooms, but I could also see him becoming afraid of being alone, considering his story only happened when he separated from Ramon and Stella. 

On top of that, I could imagine a conflict of the characters arguing about whether or not they should bring Tommy back. If they do, maybe he’s even more evil and he becomes the new villian. Maybe he will become their friend. Probably not, but who knows. What about all the other people written into Sarah’s stories? Should they unwrite them, and if they do, what does that mean for them and their town? What about the monsters in the book? Could they get free, now that Sarah is gone?

Now what about the magical item, what’s the give back? All magic has an equal and opposite reaction, or whatever the laws of magic are. You can’t use magic without paying a price. Well, considering this pen writes with her literal blood, I imagine Stella having many fainting spells and becoming ill from blood loss/low blood pressure. She could be risking her life to save her friends. That is another huge piece of tension that could affect all of the characters. I also wonder if there could be another element of Stella becoming power hungry to some extent. In the first movie, she, Chuck, and Auggie are portrayed as the outcast weird kids of their school, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Stella became somewhat obsessed with having the ability to control history with a pen and paper. I also wonder if there is some element of darkness to the pen, which is what made Sarah Bellows evil in the first place. I’m not sure, but this would be an interesting plot point and way to build more tension between the main characters.

As for Ramon, I don’t really care what happens to him. I don’t know why they wrote him off to the war. I imagine that we’ll get scenes of Stella writing letters to him. Maybe we’ll get a subplot about him not writing back and everyone being worried he died. Maybe they’ll actually kill him off. I don’t care too much about him. 

As for NEW characters, I hope we get some more actors of color in this film. I’d love to have more scenes with Lou Lou and her daughter- Maybe they have more family members that are closer in age to Stella and her friends. Maybe Lou Lou’s daughter and Stella’s dad have a fling- I don’t know, I’m just spitballing ideas here. On the topic of new couples in the second  movie though, I want Chuck and Auggie to finally confess their love for each other or I swear to god I’ll lose it. I don’t care that it’s the 60s, gay people are everywhere. I can imagine (aka I’ve already written the fanfiction) the two of them growing from their trauma, bonding further over their shared trauma, and healing/coping together (because they’re the only people who can truly understand what they both went through). 

For the big finish of the movie, it depends on the route taken, but I figure it’ll be a cacophony of Sarah Bellows’ undead family members coming back with a vengeance, Stella battling any ailments brought on by the blood-ink pen as well as any evil curses that might be trying to control her, and the big question will be how do we rewrite the undead Bellows’ stories so they don’t kill us, while also not rewriting Chuck, Auggie, Ruth, and Ramon’s stories? Or maybe it’ll tie back to The Night of the Living Dead (which they were watching at the drive-in theater in the first movie) and they’ll have to fight the undead off like zombies. I’m not sure about how I think this second movie should end, but that’s something we’d figure out more and more as the writing process goes along. And maybe one day I’ll have a full script for this second movie and I’ll force you guys to read that too. We shall see.

Anyways, thank you for reading this ramble. This movie is so dumb, but genuinely one of my favorite things ever. Even if it’s to hate watching the plot, I highly suggest checking it out. It’s scary, but it’s also beautiful, visually, and it has some amazing CGI, costuming, and special effects. 

My “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” Review, Part 2

I’ll pick up right where I left off, so if you haven’t read the first part of this deep dive, you’re gonna be a bit confused. Anyways, all the main characters are in the basement of the Bellows haunted house and Stella has founded the rumored book of Sarah Bellows’ stories. Allegedly, these stories were written in the blood of children, or some spooky BS like that. Stella doesn’t seem worried at all and immediately wants to read it, but Chuck is insistent that they get the hell out of there. Suddenly the candles in the basement go out, everyone freaks out, then they run to the door and try to leave. Turns out, evil bully Tommy has trapped them there. Ruth is there with him, begging him to let her brother and his friends out. She ends up getting shoved into the basement as well and Tommy leaves them all locked down there.

They end up getting out pretty easily, but I wanna take this time to talk more about Chuck and Auggie’s relationship. As previously stated, Chuck and Ruth are brother and sister and have a pretty average, bickering sibling relationship. Auggie has some degree of feelings for Ruth and gets flustered when he’s around her, and this really bothers Chuck. My first thought is he’s just defensive of his sister and he doesn’t like the idea of his best friend dating his sister. However, he hates when Auggie flirts with anyone. There was a moment earlier in the movie where it was clear Auggie either has or did at one point have a crush on Stella, something Chuck also didn’t approve of. Chuck doesn’t show interest in anyone, except Auggie. More on that later, but, at this point in the movie, it became clear to me that these guys have something going on. 

When they get out of the house, they get back to Ramon’s car and find it’s been vandalized by Tommy and his goons. They wrote a slur on his hood and slashed his tires. Ramon had been living out of his car, so this is a huge issue for him. Stella, for some reason, suggests he come home with her and sleep in her basement. Girl, that man is an adult and a stranger… Anyways, he agrees because he has feelings for her. When he gets to her house, this is when he starts going through her room and reading her journals and stuff. Genuinely, my rage for this man grows the more I think about the crazy stuff they just let him get away with. Anyways, he does end up sleeping in the basement and not in Stella’s room, thank GOD.

Alone in her room, Stella takes out Sarah Bellows book of stories that she stole from the Bellows’ house. Like an idiot, she took the cursed book from the haunted house and now everyone is gonna die. She starts flipping through the stories and then finds some blank pages. She’s about to close the book when red text starts appearing on the blank pages. When she touches it, the red “ink” smears. She watches the story appear on the page and starts reading it and then Tommy’s name appears in the story. The camera cuts to Tommy at his family farm, doing chores for his mom. Long story short, he gets lost in the cornfield and then gets attacked by a living scarecrow that turns him into a scarecrow. 

The next day at school, there are cops everywhere because Tommy is missing and he’s on the football team so, of course, everyone is worried. Stella is trying to show the book to Chuck and Auggie and convince them that Tommy is somehow missing because of the book. Chuck seems to believe her, given that he saw that old lady at the house and generally he seems more open to the idea of the supernatural. Auggie, on the other hand, is a skeptic. He thinks his friends are just stressed and somewhat crazy and that the book is just making things worse. This, of course, means he’s gonna die next. 

Stella ends up throwing Sarah Bellows’ book in the trash and trying to separate herself from it. She tries to convince Ramon that the book took Tommy, and they even go to see the scarecrow on Tommy’s family farm. The scarecrow is wearing Tommy’s letterman jacket. Ramon isn’t convinced, but is more worried about a run in with the cops and insists they leave. They get back to Stella’s house and Ramon is right back to snooping through her stuff. He ends up finding Sarah Bellows’ book, which has magically reappeared in Stella’s room, and he starts reading it. Stella is terrified and wants to get rid of it. They fight over it, but then a new story starts being written and it’s about Auggie. Stella tries to contact Auggie on their walkie talkies, and she gets a hold of him but he’s still dismissive and doesn’t believe her. Eventually his story starts coming true and he freaks out. Stella and Ramon try to get to Auggie’s house and save him, but they’re too late. Auggie’s story is the story about the corpse’s toe that ends up in someone’s stew, and then the corpse comes back for their toe. Auggie ends up hiding under his bed but then gets dragged away by the corpse. It’s not clear where he goes, given he gets dragged through his wall and out of time and space. 

This is where another big question presents itself to me. Are people dying? Are they being transported to the book universe? Is that like limbo? Where are they going and can they come back? I have answered those questions on my own, but obviously none of those answers are canon. 

Anyways, Auggie is gone, and Stella has to break the news to Chuck and Ruth. Chuck loses his absolute mind over this. Like Achilles after the death of Patroclus, Chuck is angry, confused, and crying about how they have to get Auggie back. Chuck suggests they go to the police, but Ramon immediately shuts that idea down because he doesn’t want to talk to the cops. While I don’t think the cops could help them in this situation, I’m still pissed at how dismissive Ramon is. Like no one said you had to go?? We’ll go talk to the cops and you stay here!!!! Jesus… Anyways, Ruth still doesn’t believe that anything is going wrong- She thinks it’s some Halloween prank. She leaves in a huff because she is in the school play and has to go get ready. So, naturally, she’ll be attacked next.

In the meantime, Chuck, Stella, and Ramon try to do more research. They try to burn the book- doesn’t work. They go to the library to learn more about the Bellows family and Sarah Bellows as a person. While at the library, a new story starts being written and it’s clearly about Ruth. This leads to one of the more popular scenes in the movie, and one I still close my eyes during, despite having seen this movie multiple times. So, Ruth has had this pimple on her cheek from the beginning of the movie and it’s only gotten worse. Now, mere minutes before she’s supposed to go on stage for her performance, her pimple is swelling and pulsing. She runs to the bathroom to try and cover it up with more powder, but it ends up exploding into millions of spiders. I’m recoiling in my skin just thinking about it. However, Ruth doesn’t die. Stella and the gang are able to get to her in time. Chuck comforts his sister and protects her from the spiders while Stella and Ramon kinda just stare on in shock and horror.

Ruth ends up being sent to a mental hospital, but at least she’s alive. She will be important later, so don’t forget her. Anyways, Stella and Chuck have a conversation after Ruth gets driven off; Chuck is crying because he just lost his best friend and his sister, and Stella is like “It’s all ok though because we’re a team and we’ll figure it out” or whatever. Then the cops confront them and are like “Why are you guys always around or friends with the people being taken?” and they’re like “I don’t know, that’s so weird… Maybe you guys should do your job better”. There was also a scene after Tommy’s death where the main evil cop tried to accuse Ramon of killing or kidnapping Tommy, so it’s clear that all the cops in this town have it out for them. 

After Ruth is taken to the mental hospital, Stella, Chuck, and Ramon decide to do more research into Sarah Bellows in hopes of figuring out how to break this curse/get rid of the book. They visit an older black woman named Lou Lou, who’s mother had worked for the Bellows as a maid or servant. Lou Lou’s mother was fired as it was believed she taught black magic to Sarah Bellows. Lou Lou blind and generally unstable, both with her physical and mental health. Regardless, she remembers Sarah Bellows and tells the three main characters that Sarah was a misunderstood young girl who was abused by her family. When she sees the book, she gets upset and tells them they shouldn’t have messed with it. She begins spiraling and rambling about Sarah’s suicide after she was forced into a mental hospital by her family. The main three are quickly rushed out by Lou Lou’s daughter. 

This new clue leads the main three to break into the mental hospital that Sarah had been placed in. The security on this place is so insanely lax- I understand it was the sixties, but the scene of them sneaking in behind some other doctors genuinely felt like a slap in the face. Some parts of this movie are not taken nearly as seriously as they warrant, and this moment is definitely one of those. 

Anyways, they’re trying to find the records room where all the patient information is stored. Illegal, but who cares. The records room is dubbed the “red room” for some wack reason, but this really bothers Chuck as the mysterious room from the past that he saw while hiding at the Bellows’ house was a red room. He refuses to go with them, and they split up. Stupid, but I love Chuck so I’m defending him on this one. He was protecting his peace. Stella and Ramon go to the red room, and Chuck goes up to the top floor. 

This is where we get, arguable, the most popular and recognizable scenes in the whole movie. Chuck gets lost on the top floor and starts hyperventilating, then the security alarms start blaring because they finally realized three kids just broke in and red lights start flashing. Chuck is freaking out, running through the halls and trying to find his way out, when suddenly he sees this extremely pale, extremely bloated creature with long black hair slowly walking toward him. No matter what door he opens or what hallway he turns on, she’s there. I could go on and on about Chuck’s character and the possible metaphors behind this scene, but I’ll save that for later. Anyways, he ends up being consumed by this creature? It’s hard to explain- There are multiple versions of this creature and two of them get him in the middle and kinda merge together, around him? And he disappears into thin air. Crazy way to die. 

We’re almost at the end! Gonna call this here but the final part of this review will wrap up the general storyline, as well as my thoughts on how a second movie should go. I may even write an entirely different blog about the implications of the character’s and their deaths/stories, because this is something very important to me and I think about it often. Even little details, like the character’s halloween costumes, their house designs, their names- I love over-analysing stuff guys. Thanks for letting me ramble. I’ll see you again next week!