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As much as we all chuckle at Katie Holmes as an actress, I have to give her credit for continuing to at least try despite all of her critical and commercial failures since she married Tom Cruise (and was supposed to become, you know, the next big thing). Instead, she’s made one very brief appearance on an episode of “Eli Stone,” botched the Jackie role in “The Kennedys,” and appeared in three movies — Mad Money, The Romantics, and The Extra Man — that have gone absolutely nowhere.
Now, Holmes has somehow landed a role in a Guillermo del Toro-produced film, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, which is a remake of the 1973 made-for-TV movie and also stars Guy Pearce and Bailee Madison. The premise involves a young girl who goes to live with her father and girlfriend in a house where menacing creatures appear with extreme smoker’s voices and try to claim her for themselves. Naturally, the film’s atmosphere is shrouded in a shadowy darkness, which is probably where a lot of the scares come from, but here’s the trailer, so you may judge for yourselves:
Meh. The trailer actually makes the film itself look sufficiently creepy, and many horror fans have already realized that there’s not much else coming out this summer in the genre, so I imagine that this movie will fare much better at the box office than most films starring Katie Holmes do. Still, Katie herself fares quite poorly at what should be a relatively easy role to pull off; but instead of looking scared, she just looks like her usual zombie self. I also laughed at her “frustrated” moment where she’s presumably trying to talk Guy Pearce into leaving the home because, as usual, her acting is ridiculous and unnatural looking. Poor Katie Holmes should stick to playing at being a fashion designer and then wearing her busted designs on the red carpet. She’s at least good at creating and wearing fug outfits for our amusement.
Movie poster courtesy of Rope of Silicon
Written by Bedhead
Posted in Guy Pearce, Katie Holmes
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34 Responses to “The trailer for Katie Holmes’ horror movie actually isn’t terrible”
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If she wore that Magenta Madness design in the film, This whole film would be awesome. I love Guy Pearce and I bet he felt like “its money. its money. its money” the whole way through filming. LOL
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My sisters and I saw the original TV movie when we were kids and it scared the crap out of us. “Sally we want you” has been a running gag in my family… still to this day, when my father wants to freak us out he’ll whisper it in our ear, or leave it on our answering machines.
So, to say that Holmes acting scared me more than hearing that phrase again, well that is a serious statement!
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If Del Toro was directing it I’d watch that for sure…although I trust him as a producer too (LOVED The Orphanage).
Side note: compared to living with a stone cold scientologist, any horror film plot looks like vacations.
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I like Guy Pearce. I like Guillermo del Toro. (Pan’s Labyrinth is my fave!) But I don’t like re-makes – a Polaroid camera? Definitely ’73. And I don’t like KH’s “acting” ability. Or lack thereof.
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Looks like a decent movie. But for some reason, I just think that Katie is box-office poison. Maybe she should be in a movie in which we don’t know it’s her…
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I love Joey Potter. I love bank robbery type movies when they get away with it (YEARS spent as a teller.) More than any of that I LOVE QUEEN! So Mad Money made me really happy. The others, I have not seen. I won’t see this because I don’t do scary, but I wish I did because I miss Joey Potter.
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This had bettter be good! It’s Guillermo for christ’s sake! I was so psyched by a new movie by him but then I heard Katie Holmes was in it and I was immediately bummed the frick out. I’ll still see it cause any movie he’s attached to is awesome. His movies are the only ones that a lot of people I know will go out of there way to see that have subtitles.
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Poor Katie. Scientology definetely sucked away from her whatever acting ability she had. Must be all that auditing.
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i saw the original too. still to do this day i am freaked by their voices. Had a co-worker that would sneak up and whisper Sally… in my ear.
chills… but i will go see it.
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I think it’s her voice for me. It’s high and kinda whiny sounding like she’s sucking her throat back or something. I’ll definitely go see it though, love horror movies
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I don’t think we saw enough of her in the trailer to know for sure how good or bad she is in the movie. I kind of feel like since she married Tom she can’t win with most people. I’m not saying she’s the most talented actress out there, but I also don’t think she’s as bad as some seem to think. If she weren’t married to the lift-wearing Scientolomidget, would people still find her so offensive? I guess I feel badly for her, as being trapped in that world must be hell. I also have a pathological need to give people the benefit of the doubt, lol.
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Is this the one that was filmed in Australia ages ago?? I thought that movie had been and gone straight to dvd already!
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@Eve: YES!! The Orphanage, fantastic. The Devil’s Backbone had some pretty scary moments as well, but wasn’t touching the way The Orphanage was.
This film seems ok, but kind of old hat. Difficult to tell from the trailer. That poster is pretty bad though, is that a joke?
Katie was good in The Gift, but I was disappointed she went topless, but her performance was pretty solid.
Her acting seems so suffer from her not really knowing who she is. There’s nothing solid underneath and it shows.
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@ Runs with Scissors:
This post contains *SPOILERS* (for those who haven’t seen these films).
I cried while watching The Orphanage. My only issue with it was that very last scene featuring her husband picking up the necklace (it was the only slightly cheesy thing about it). I felt like I was about to throw up my heart and lungs during most of the film — it’s a spine chilling feeling when she plays that “un, dos, tres bate la pared” game with the children’s ghosts. Yikes!
But when I finally got to know exactly what happened to her son, I couldn’t stop crying.
I have to say this about The Devil’s Backbone: the first time I watched it I didn’t think it was interesting or terrifying enough, perhaps because I had been influenced by the “monsters and devils” kind of horror films and thought the “ghosts” type not that thrilling. But when I watched it the second time I found that it was a really good film (also very sad), not as much as The Orphanage but still very good. That special effect when the boy’s ghost shows up* is creepy yet beautiful.
*There’s a little smoke coming out of his shoulders, I don’t know how to describe it — and that he looks like he’s submerged in water (which we understand later why). I love the visual style Del Toro gives to his films.
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I love Guillermo del Toro, especially Pan’s Labyrinth. That was a scary, sad (very sad) movie and this one looks good too though the trailer is too long and not effective, IMO.
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I really like scary movies, this one looks pretty good. This could be a good break for Kate, who knows she might finally have a blockbuster with this one.
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Re: The Orphanage: What’s-his-face (dude married to Maggie Gyllenhaal IRL) totally got what he deserved.
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@ Original Bellaluna:
I didn’t get your last comment (# 17). The Orphanage is a Spanish film about a woman who used to live in an orphanage, was adopted but later she returns to the place (now closed) to re-open it as an orphanage for children with mental and physical disabilities.
Or were you talking about “Orphan” (with Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard)?
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@ Eve – Yeah, that’s my bad. I was talking about Orphan. *blushes* (You can see how distracted I am this a.m. can’t you?)
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I feel like The Orphanage was just pure genius! It was this like scary horrorish movie and then the ending was so heartwarming! I cried and and just felt really happy and couldnt believe they totally turned it around like that.
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@ Original Bellaluna:
Yes, I got that you were mixing up the films — just wanted to make clear before anyone attacked you (the guy in The Orphanage is an extremely loving husband and he goes through hell while trying to support his wife after their son disappears).
In “Orphan” I was disappointed with the ending because I wish her character was indeed a psychotic child (turns out she had a rare type of dwarfism). I was creeped out by her while I thought she was a little girl, when the “twist” was revealed I was like “meh!”.
And yes, I’m obviously a “movie geek”.
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@Eve, great write up! Right on the money. I’m still haunted by that scene with her and the children and yes, I was crying too, which is really tough to get me to do. Agree about the necklace too. I need to give The Devil’s Backbone another look, that smoke effect was incredible, yes creepy, but beautiful. I love that you’re a film geek.
Have you seen Let the Right One In? Do you have any other’s you’d recommend?
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@ Runs with Scissors:
Now that I checked the meaning of “geek” once again, I think I may have exaggerated my own skills a bit. I mean, it’s not that I’m an expert about movie making, I’m more like one of those nerds who remember everything: plot, dialogues, actors, scenes and so on.
I have seen Let The Right One In, but the original version (the Swedish film) and yes, I liked it very much. It’s scary to think about what she has to do in order to “survive” (if we can call it that) but also moving, because she looked so lonely and helpless. I felt more sorry for her than anything else.
The scene featuring the cats attacking the woman (in the original version) looked fake because of the poor CGI job, but all the rest was great. I especially like that the film takes place in the 1980s.
EDIT: The American version is called “Let Me In” so I wasn’t sure which one you were referring to.
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@ Eve – I need to see The Orphanage. (But not while I’m in the house alone.)
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The Orphanage is a wonderfully and tastefully done movie, but unfortunately horror movies do not scare me much, unless the plot revolves around demons and exorcisms.
Another good horror movie is the French “Martyrs”. The plot is convincing mostly because as in The Orphanage you can’t help but feeling for one of the two lead protagonists and share her constant state of fear and hate. I warn you, it’s a very brutal movie.
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I love Guy Pearce, but I can’t stand scary movies, so I’m not sure if I’ll be able to watch… Maybe I’ll rent it so I can turn the sound down. As for Katie Holmes, well, we’ll see. There was a time that I thought she was a decent actress, but I think maybe “Joey Potter” was really just Katie being Katie.
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@Solveig: ‘Martyrs’ YES! Caveat: The New French Extremity in horror is definitely that – extreme. A person might like horror and hate the film. Disturbing is an understatement. ‘Inside’ was good too.
Anybody seen ‘Carver’? Loved it. And why I overlooked ‘Jeepers Creepers’ for so long I’ll never know.
@Eve: ‘Let the Right One In’ was beautiful. I have no interest seeing in the remake.
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the original “The Vanishing” – if you haven’t seen it, you must. Solid psychological thriller that still haunts me. The remake with Keifer Sutherland and Jeff Bridges… no. Just no. But the original, oh yes.
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Granted, shes no GREAT talent. But shes not bad either. She’s quite okay actually! Her acting certainly doesnt “ruin” any movies for me. So I dont get all the hate towards her acting abilities.
Just because she married Tom Cruise, doesnt mean she should be equal to him in the talent department.
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I love mad money! It is cheesy and entertaining.
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I love Del Torro, I would totally go see this. Looks scary.
Now I actually kind of thought the end of Martyrs was really stupid and gross.
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@ Original Bellaluna:
@ Eve – I need to see The Orphanage. (But not while I’m in the house alone.)
Yes, you have to. It’s a must see. But I think it’s better experienced if you watch it by yourself (seriously).
@ Bill Hicks is God:
@Eve: ‘Let the Right One In’ was beautiful. I have no interest seeing in the remake.
Me neither, because I fear I may get pissed off at the American producers’s attempt at making everything more commercially pretty (example, the American version of Wim Wenders’s Wings of Desire is an insult to my intelligence). A friend of mine asked me to watch Let Me In but I don’t think I will…
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GAHHHH! I meant “attempt at making everything commercially prettier”.
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“…where menacing creatures appear with extreme smokers voices and try to claim her for themselves.”
++ ++ ++
So Lindsay Lohan is after her?
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