Critic Reviews

Indeed, Goyer has penned many scripts superior to this one (he co-wrote cult gem Dark City), but he does make sure you're never far away from a big "Boo!"

I enjoyed the visual effects used to create some hellish creatures and the amusing nods to "The Exorcist" - cranial rotation, even a spooky staircase. But the movie slips in the last act.

What more could a horror fan ask for than a spook-fest that feels pure in its intentions while taking full advantage of every opportunity to scare us silly?

For as long as it forges ahead without explanations, The Unborn works, in its way, as a series of snap-cut gotchas introducing each new contestant in its pageant of cold-sweat set pieces.

Whereas Japanese horror movies have been criticized for not making sense, The Unborn errs on the opposite extreme, coming off all the more ridiculous for over-explaining itself.

What "The Exorcist" might look like if Madonna rewrote it, this silly fright flick finds college student Casey (Odette Yustman) haunted by a Kabbalistic demon.

This material is offensive. The film may end with a straight-faced reassurance that "no actual Torah scrolls were destroyed or damaged in the making of this motion picture," but it's perfectly willing to exploit the Holocaust for cheap, weak thrills.

A laughably bad horror flick.

Mostly, though, the movie is something of a snooze, a gabby PG-13 horror flick whose most shocking image might be the bored look on Gary Oldman's face as he goes through the motions of playing the rabbi in charge of dispatching the film's damnable demon to somewhere over hell's rainbow.

The film teeters so perilously and routinely at the edge of camp, both with some of its casting choices and some unfortunate dialogue (the repeated warning that "Jumby wants to be born now"), that it's hard to know if Mr. Goyer wants to make us howl with fear or laughter.