When four teenagers find a story book in a haunted house they find the stories are more powerful than they could imagine.

Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark is a clever way to tell an anthology horror story. Based on a book published in 1981 by Alvin Schwartz and keeping very faithful to the original art in that book by Stephen Gammell it connects a series of random camp fire horror stories with an over arching tale.

It’s an odd film in that it seems to be confused as to its audience. The books (it’s now a trilogy) are aimed at children, despite some challenges from groups saying they are not suitable. The film however carries a 15 certificate in the UK, where the books are relatively unknown. But whilst the effects are very good, the film itself is not particularly scary. Which means that younger teens can not watch it and any veteran of horror movies is not going to have any feathers ruffled by it.

In terms of performances and execution it’s fine. Special mention must go to the effects work, but otherwise “it’s fine” is as far as it goes.