Under the Bed

You can tell from the title alone that "Under the Bed" is attempting to pay homage to the host of other child-horror movies that proceeded it in the eighties. You can see there is real love for films like "Gremlins" "Monster Squad" and even "Poltegeist." The story starts out well enough with a teenage boy returning home years after a tragic event took his mother's life. His younger brother is happy to see him back, but old wounds from the past resurface and both boys are put in a position where they must choose to finally confront the monster that has been plaguing their family for years. The major problem with "Under the Bed" is that it really has no idea what kind of movie it wants to be. Moments in the movie have an innocence long lost throughout the years of horror, but at other times it attempts to be too grown up for its own good by using profanity and generous amounts of fake blood. If this was the movies only sin, we could probably give it a pass, but it is not. The script is shaky to say the least, while many parts throughout simply do not make sense. It also does not help that the shoestring budget is very evident up until the last 20 minutes of the movie. I certainly respect the guts of all involved in trying to accomplish this feat on what little they had to work with, but there are much more suitable, and frankly better child horror movies to sit down and watch for ninety minutes.