AboveDeepBuggy Some things I liked some I did not.

Spoonixel Amateur movie with Big budget

Wyatt There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Milo-Jeeder The story goes something like this: A sweet and somewhat oblivious young lady named Alicianne Del Mar is hired as a baby-sitter for a little girl named Rosalie Nordon, who is grieving the lost of her mother. When Alicianne is driving to the Nordon's house, in the middle of nowhere, her car breaks down and she finds herself stranded in some creepy woods (that's original). Alicianne is assisted by Mrs. Whitfield, a noisy elderly woman with a very annoying high-pitched voice, who lives in the area. Mrs. Whitfield, who doesn't have much of a life, invites Alicianne for a cup of tea and suddenly begins to say nasty things about the Nordons (we all know old ladies like this, don't we?). The old bitty seems to particularly dislike little Rosalie and she even blames the child for a lot of strange things that happen in the area, without being too specific about it. Alicianne, however, doesn't take the accusations very seriously and she assumes that the little girl's questionable behavior may come from the fact that she has recently lost her mother. Yeah, if only... When Alicianne arrives to the Nordon residence, Rosalie's father doesn't exactly offer her a friendly welcome. The man (who looks like he's in this sixties, if anything) acts cranky for no reason and then, out of nowhere, he begins to mumble some incoherencies about how he cannot stand nervous women and a bunch of other nonsense. At this point, we can only assume that Alicianne will quit the next day... but then, Rosalie's older brother, Len, enters the scene and apologizes for his father's rustic manners. After this, Alicianne goes upstairs and walks into Rosalie's room, without even knocking first (because being intrusive is always a good way to bond with a child). After Alicianne introduces herself to Rosalie, the child randomly begins to talk about her late mother's beautiful hair (um, okay) and then points out a photograph of the alleged woman, which actually looks more like a portrait from the XIX century (seriously, couldn't they get a photograph of a woman from the 60s, 50s or even 40s?) Against all odds, the child becomes rather attached to Alicianne and she even gets a little bit posessive, too. Though the cutesy baby-sitter tries to be in good terms with the child, the truth is that Rosalie is, in fact, very weird and she does a lot of strange things, like, walking around the cemetery at the night (yikes!). Rosalie doens't even bother hiding her true colors and she proudly behaves cynically, sinister and downright disrespectful towards her father, by defying him, telling him to shut up and even calling him "old man". Rosalie's morbid behavior would have made her really popular nowadays, where being rude, horrible and creepy is trendy, but this was the 70s, where little girls were still expected to be nice and cute, so obviously, nobody likes Rosalie. Was Mrs. Whitfield right all along? Yes, Rosalie is clearly not an ordinary girl and not only because of her manners, but also, because she seems to have a special power tha she uses for evil purposes. When the innocent baby-sitter discovers the truth, she teams up with Rosalie's brother in order to save their sorry behinds, before it's too late. All right, I love this movie and not even in a patronizing way. I know it may seem like I was making fun of it during my recap of the story, and maybe I was, but I actually love "The Child" and the random nature of it, is one of the main reasons why I do. The thing is: I'm not sure if the nonsensical dialogs and situation are the result of poor writting or if this is some kind of oniric type of story-telling. Perhaps a little bit of both? Since Robert Voskanian, the director, didn't do any other films, we'll never know if his randomness regarding the story and the bizarre dialogs were the result of poor writting or if this is simply his style (kind of like, a poor man's David Lynch). The editing, the photography, the camera movements, angles and shots seem rather unpolished and "unprofessional" for the lack of a better word. I mean, I can absolutely appreciate films that try not to be so tidy and nicely done, so using the word "professional" or "unprofessional" can be a bit out of place, when it comes to art. Honestly, to me, this is a solid horror film by accident, as it seems like they pretty much overlooked certain technical aspects, and rushed things towards the last minutes, as they realized that the production had ran out of budget before the filming was over. I cannot really elaborate a list with all the details that give away the fact that this production was messy, because it would be a very long list and then, the review would get super boring, so you're going to have to trust me on this one. Be that as it may, the bizarre photography and camera work, along with the amateurish editing, actually work well. There are enough "nicely done" horror movies, technically speaking, and I'd be more than happy to see more "messy" films like this, because this so-called messiness helps to create a dark an chaotic atmosphere. The fact that the movie was mostly dubbed (and it is very obvious) also gives "The Child" a rather weird and eerie vibe. I don't know anything about the filming locations, but the woods and the big house where the story take place are eerie and both sceneries convey a feeling of isolation and gloominess. I don't find nature and isolation depressing per se, but when you put these characters in this sceneries, I really do. Rosalie is, in fact, very creepy and the relationship between her and her father is, in my opinion, one of the best aspects of this film. Aside from the fact that both characters are mostly hillariously bizarre, the truth is that Mr. Nordon appears to be a very troubled and dark character, which we can mostly notice in one scene, in which he laughs while telling the story of a bunch of kids who accidentally poisoned themselves, by ingesting oleander sap. Now, I also laughed when the old man begun to laugh at the children, but strangely, I found it disturbing, too. My main criticism regarding this film comes from the fact that "The Child" could have used a little bit more character development, since we don't get to know enough about Rosalie's late mother, which is crucial to the story. Are we supposed to asume that Rosalie inherited her powers from her mother or her mother (who was very interested in the human mind) spent her entire life learning how to develop powers and she passed that knowledge to her child? Was Mrs. Nordon really such a strange woman or was she simply a misunderstood person, who was interested in the human mind? A nice flashback or a final revelation would have been very much appreciated. Part of Rosalie's background story is revealed by Mrs. Whitfield, in my opinion, that wasn't enough. Other than that, "The Child" is a very enjoyable little flick and I highly recommend it to horror fans who don't take films too seriously all the time.

BaronBl00d A little girl lives with her father and brother in the middle of the countryside. This little girl Rosalie has some psychotic tendencies as the movie opens with her feeding kittens to some kind of creatures in the cemetery, and she has recently lost her mother who went crazy but whilst alive enjoyed staying in the woods all night. The premise of the film has a new young lady coming to Rosalie to take care of her. She is introduced to the evil of the woods while driving and, imagine the suspense here, experiences a huge blue barrel falling over the side of a cliff to somehow stop her car dead in its tracks. From there she walks to the nearest house and discovers Mrs. Whitfield who then goes into a whole lot of explanation about Rosalie and her family. The earnestness exuded by the Mrs. Whitfield character has to be seen to be believed. Well, the young lady meets up with the child and we soon learn that not only is she strange but everyone in the film is very bizarre as well. They all do share one thing in common which is none of them ever heard of an acting school. None of these people can act - as evidenced by the few vehicles any of them in the entire film appeared in before or since - and all of them look like they have little idea what is going on, pause to remember lines, and have all the conviction of a paper bag. The director plods through the material in a slow pace with this horrible piano music crescendoing here and there at things that are suppose to be scary. It takes us a bit before we get to a couple of murders by the creature friends, but by that time I didn't care. The murders are not convincing either, and truth be told the whole film looks like someone through it together on their friend's farm with the people and things on hand there. That all being said the ending does have some creepy aspects to it though we don't learn one darn thing about why Rosalie is like this or more importantly who the creature with the cheap masks are. Cheap doesn't even begin to describe the budget here with. It basically is a couple old farmhouses and some sheds at the end and of course the woods. Someone lent the director a couple old cars too. No special effects of any kind and only the most minimal make-up. There are so many guffaws/ridiculous moments to list, but I will just list a few here that at the very least made me chuckle from the lack of aptitude from the creative powers involved: 1)Watch the gardener's body well after he has been "slain". Len comes in and sees him butchered and you can see his fat belly heave with life. 2)the dying scene at the end where the actress playing Rosalie is killed. She looks like she is listening to directions and takes her sweet time dying considering the method. 3)How about the guy playing Roaslie's father giving us a cranky poor man's Andy Griffith. The scene where he is laughing about boy scouts dying was a weird hoot. The Child is indeed a very bad film and is very bad even for the standards of 70's cheese if you will. This isn't a B film but more like a Z film with producer Harry Novak making some money on virtually nothing.

anxietyresister If you're going to look after a child, make sure they don't live anywhere near a graveyard. Especially if said kid has a habit of drawing gory pictures and disappears at night among the tombstones to see her 'friends'. But, our long haired heroine, oblivious to all the signs, shacks up with her family the Nortons, which include a strict father and a dullard older brother who becomes a love interest for our budding babysitter. Even more spooky than the zombie gang outside is the cast's tendency to talk even when their lips aren't moving, and for the words to not match the movement of their mouths. But enough of that.. domestic animals are being sacrificed, old ladies are having eyeballs torn out and the orchestra won't shut up during any scene, even the quiet ones. Oh, and the editor is having a day off going by the way the film drones on.In fact, it would been better if everybody involved had taken a breather, smelt what they'd signed up for and gone AWOL. Yes, I know it's hard to get into movies these days, but this sort of starter point is not one on your CV you'd want. If would be like a trainee farm labourer having a conviction for chicken molesting. Featuring one of the worst lead performances ever by the shrill Laurel Barnett, and another almost equally as bad by the charisma-free child actress Rosalie Cole (The next Dakota Fanning she ain't) the film meanders on and on with nothing but padding until we get what passes for a climax.This involves five or six members of the undead barricading our utterly useless heroine in a shed, while her bit of rough fends off these ghouls with a plank of wood, a one shell shotgun and whatever he can lay his hands on. But back up a minute.. earlier on they were in the car, and they accidentally discovered that the creatures found the noise of the horn so repellent they shuffled off at the sound of it. So do they stay where they are safe? No of course not, they run off to this abandoned building in the middle of nowhere, so the bloke can prove what a hardnut he is the girl can act like she's having a nervous breakdown.Finally, the film closes. It doesn't end, it just goes to a grinding halt. The main character wanders back to her vehicle covered in fake blood, as if nothing horrible had happened. But, my dear viewer, something horrible has happened. You have just sat through one of the most lamebrained, boring horror films you're ever likely to see, and lost 82 minutes of your life you'll never get back. Just think.. years from now on your deathbed, what you'd trade an hour and 22 minutes for just to spend a bit of extra time with your family. Sadly, it's already too late for me. Don't you make the same mistake :( 2/10

adrian_tripod We've all seen Night of the Living Dead and Dawn, and Day... most of us have seen Lucio Fulci's zombies, and some will have ventured into the Manchester Morgue... but if you like the zombie subgenre best check out The Child, a movie with a mid-seventies homemade feel, which springs some scary groping monsters on the camera in the last twenty minutes, and packs the rest of the running time with strange music, weird camera angles and warped acting as well. They really don't make them like this any more. The acting feels like the attempts of a schizo to pass for normal on a bad day. There's no attempt at realism because dry ice wafts around as soon as the heroine crashes her old-fashioned car at the start of the film. Old ladies who should just be side-line characters hog the script with eccentric non-actor habits. The camera tilts like a sick sailor. The music is Liberace vamping for Lon Chaney's stage show, alongside a deranged scorpion on a synthesizer keyboard. The story and characters are almost non-existent (although the lead female has 'problems'). It's like a fever dream before a scriptwriting session - better than a script, in other words. It refuses to become a normal movie and that makes it special. Watch it late at night but not too late...