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Movie Review for Dark Water
Movie Review for
Dark Water
126 Reviews total.
Release date: 7/8/2005
Run length: 104 mins.
Categories:
Suspense/Horror
,
Thriller
,
Adaptation
,
Remake
Summary:
It all begins inside Apartment 9F. This is where a single mother, Dahlia Williams, is trying to make a brand-new start in life. Attempting to escape from a bitter custody battle with her estranged husband, Dahlia moves with her daughter Ceci to a dilapidated, sprawling housing block on Roosevelt Island at the very edges of New York City. Their new home provides little refuge. The rundown tower’s creepy noises, rickety elevator and sinister dark water stains are eerie enough. But Dahlia begins to suspect there is a far greater threat. Just who or what is it that is playing mind games with Dahlia--and can she trust her own senses when her imagination is also running wild? As Ceci's ghostly encounters and an array of strange occurrences continue to build, Dahlia suddenly must question who she can trust and in what she can believe. But she will stop at nothing to figure out the riddle and protect her daughter--even as the dark water closes in around them.
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Kevin Carr
of 7M Pictures (7/0)
About half-way through the movie, I wanted to stand up and scream, 'Okay, I get it! Jennifer Conn...
By
Rebecca Murray
of About.com (7/0)
The only thing scary about Dark Water is the fact the movie never seems to end.
By
Mike McGranaghan
of Aisle Seat (7/0)
Dark Water is much more ambitious and classy than the advertising would lead you to beli...
By
Bob Longino
of Atlanta Journal-Constitution (7/0)
...as much a psychological drama as it is a ghost story.
By
Nev Pierce
of BBC (7/0)
Dark Water is a failure as a horror movie.
By
Brian Juergens
of Bloody Disgusting (7/0)
It's more Kramer vs. Kramer than Jennifer vs. the Dead Kid in the Sink... still, too-familiar ter...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Wesley Morris
of Boston Globe (5/2)
...dramatic strengths are hamstrung by its ridiculous obligations to the original.
By
Roger Ebert
of Chicago Sun-Times (7/0)
...we're never quite sure how all the parts of the mystery fit together...
By
Roger Ebert
of Chicago Sun-Times (7/0)
Dark Water achieves some, but not all, of what we might hope for.
By
Michael Wilmington
of Chicago Tribune (7/0)
Director Walter Salles give this shocker an added psychological/ dramatic level that heightens th...
By
Michael Wilmington
of Chicago Tribune (7/0)
...a shocker with something extra.
By
Jules Brenner
of Cinema Signals (7/0)
A fine, atmospheric example of psychic horror. The grey grimness of it
serves the creepy shenani...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Jeffrey M. Anderson
of Combustible Celluloid (7/0)
As a scare film, it's a dud.
By
Harvey S. Karten
of Compuserve (7/0)
No wonder tourists avoid Roosevelt Island! Scary!
By
Matt Brunson
of Creative Loafing (7/0)
As far as American remakes of Japanese horror flicks go, this one's better than either The Ring o...
By
Philip Wuntch
of Dallas Morning News (7/0)
Dark Water will leave some viewers scratching their heads, while others will be wide-eyed with ap...
By
Todd Jorgenson
of Denton Record Chronicle (TX) (7/0)
The movie isn’t so much scary as it is unsettling, but the script lets viewers off the hook with ...
By
Scott Weinberg
of DVDTalk.com (7/0)
Equal parts quiet, creepy, tragic, and visually gorgeous, Dark Water might be one of the best mov...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
John J. Puccio
of DVDTown.com (7/0)
I found Dark Water slow and gloomy, with a lengthy buildup to a less-than-satisfying conclusion.
By
Chris Barsanti
of E! Online (7/0)
...a handsomely constructed fable that substitutes sadness for the usual shock value.
By
David Cornelius
of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
Smarter, creepier, and better than expected.
By
Erik Childress
of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
Dark Water is a been-there- done-that- over-again- rince-repeater whose true ghosts are the memor...
By
Dan Jolin
of Empire Magazine (7/0)
Interesting and unsettling, but never terrifying.
By
Owen Gleiberman
of Entertainment Weekly (7/0)
Salles realizes the rotten dank desperation of her life so vividly that he has made, in effect, t...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Eric D. Snider
of EricDSnider.com (7/0)
Japan's chief horror export used to be a giant fire-breathing lizard who smashed cities and dest...
By
Eugene Novikov
of Film Blather (7/0)
It's a beautiful, beautiful film, one so expressive that you run out of adjectives to describe it...
By
Walter Chaw
of Film Freak Central (7/0)
A mature film about the courage it takes to survive in a mortal world that's dependent on tempora...
By
Rex Roberts
of Film Journal International (7/0)
A moody, quirky movie that, although flawed, is worth a walk to the theatre in a gentle rain.
By
Pete Vonder Haar
of Film Threat (7/0)
I think it’s finally time to call a moratorium on American remakes of Japanese horror films.
By
Chris Barsanti
of filmcritic.com (7/0)
admirable simplicity with an all-enveloping mood
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Brian Orndorf
of FilmJerk.com (7/0)
It's familiar material twisted into interesting directions, and even if it doesn’t always succeed...
By
Brian Orndorf
of FilmJerk.com (7/0)
It's familiar material twisted into interesting directions, and even if it doesn’t always succeed...
By
Edward Havens
of FilmJerk.com (7/0)
Would have been... more entertaining as an absurdist comedy about the troubles one woman will go ...
By
Anderson Jones
of FilmStew.com (7/0)
As we call it around the FilmStew water cooler, “The Second in a Series of Jennifer Connelly's At...
By
MaryAnn Johanson
of Flick Filosopher (7/0)
[T]he relentless psychological desolation that rumbles ominously throughout is unique, and elevat...
By
Bill Clark
of FromTheBalcony (7/0)
Salles has crafted a moody, even gothic, psychological thriller that never fails to hold the view...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Eric Lurio
of Greenwich Village Gazette (7/0)
This film is a wilter.
By
Peter Canavese
of Groucho Reviews (7/0)
Though Dark Water doesn't run deep....Salles keeps his head above [it]...with superior acting, mi...
By
Ross Anthony
of Hollywood Report Card (7/0)
A high quality production, with strong direction, great acting, but ultimately not much crawling ...
By
Michael Rechtshaffen
of Hollywood Reporter (7/0)
...ultimately fails to reward all the little shivers with any satisfying jolts.
By
Staci Layne Wilson
of Horror.com (7/0)
The tagline says, 'Some mysteries were never meant to be solved.' Unfortunately, the filmmakers s...
By
Michael Hardy
of Houston Chronicle (7/0)
Salles seems too uncomfortable with the fantastic to get full value from the creeps and jumps his...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Jeff Otto
of IGN Movies (7/0)
Connelly's terrific performance enhances this quietly atmospheric ghost story.
By
Jackie K. Cooper
of jackiekcooper.com (7/0)
Nobody plays vulnerable better than Jennifer Connelly
By
Bruce Kirkland
of Jam! Movies (7/0)
Despite spinning a convincing tale in the first two acts, Salles' final act is so awkwardly stage...
By
Andrea Chase
of Killer Movie Reviews (7/0)
A great deal of nothing happens . . . before the reveal that isn’t so much a twist as pretty much...
By
Linda Cook
of KWQC-TV (Iowa) (7/0)
Almost as murky as its title "Dark Water" earns an average rating amidst other - and mostly lesse...
By
Eric Melin
of Lawrence.com (7/0)
[It] has a split personality, as it contains two movies that are frequently at odds with each oth...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
John Larsen
of Light Views (7/0)
It's a copy, a good copy, but a copy none the less.
By
Prairie Miller
of Long Island Press (7/0)
This murky urban ghost story about a possible haunted hi rise of horrors, basically lets the all-...
By
Andy Klein
of Los Angeles CityBeat (7/0)
...nicely atmospheric, but the atmosphere isn’t quite enough to sustain interest in the absence o...
By
Kevin Crust
of Los Angeles Times (7/0)
A distressing, subtly suspenseful film full of emotional resonance.
By
Duane Dudek
of Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (7/0)
While this umpteenth variation on the 'supernatural-or-psychological?' horror film theme has an i...
By
Susan Granger
of Modamag.com (7/0)
Creepy, chilling, complex - bottom line: it's a very scary movie.
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Ken Hanke
of Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC) (7/0)
This slow-paced art film of some considerable merit has bamboozled its way into multiplexes by ma...
By
Jorge Avila Andrade
of Moviola (7/0)
Un filme bien hecho, mucho mejor actuado y que, a pesar de ser innecesario, logra firmemente su c...
By
Michael Dequina
of Mr. Brown's Movies (7/0)
Jennifer Connelly gives another wrenching and indelible turn.
By
Kurt Loder
of MTV (7/0)
[E]xecuted just about as well as it possibly could be … 'Dark Water' sinks under the weight of it...
By
Luke Y. Thompson
of New Times (7/0)
The Pang Brothers’ The Eye and Gore Verbinski’s The Ring were better remakes of Dark Water than t...
By
Frank Swietek
of One Guy's Opinion (7/0)
This 'Water' may be agreeably dark, but it turns out that it's disappointingly shallow, too.
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Steve Schneider
of Orlando Weekly (7/0)
The difference between Dark Water and most of its forebears is the way it values emotional invest...
By
Jeanne Aufmuth
of Palo Alto Weekly (7/0)
Conventions aside the film establishes a palpable sense of suspicion and dread and manages to ret...
By
Cynthia Fuchs
of PopMatters (7/0)
Almost worse than these competing illogics, the film offers what might be the embodiment of logic...
By
David Nusair
of Reel Film Reviews (7/0)
...[one of the best] films to hit theaters in a long while...a refreshing change of pace from the...
By
Mark Pfeiffer
of Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema (7/0)
[Connelly] does superior work creating a woman struggling to be a good mother while feeling like ...
By
Kim Morgan
of Reel.com (7/0)
Confined by the supposed thrills and chills of pseudo-J-horror, the film's allegorical depth rema...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Laura Clifford
of Reeling Reviews (7/0)
It's hard to resist sure-to-be-cliched adjectives like soggy and waterlogged when describing this...
By
Robin Clifford
of Reeling Reviews (7/0)
The horror of this mostly horrorless movie consists of the title water gushing from every plumbin...
By
James Berardinelli
of ReelViews (7/0)
Dark Water has plenty of creepy moments, but few scares, and it becomes bogged down in setup.
By
Peter Travers
of Rolling Stone (7/0)
...unleashes a torrent of suspense for one purpose: to plumb the violence of the mind.
By
Peter Travers
of Rolling Stone (7/0)
A classy ghost story is just the ticket in a summer of crass jolts.
By
James O'Ehley
of SA Movie & DVD Magazine (7/0)
The gore-free Dark Water tries hard to establish a creepy atmosphere, but instead winds up being ...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
James O'Ehley
of SA Movie & DVD Magazine (7/0)
The gore-free Dark Water tries hard to establish a creepy atmosphere, but instead winds up being ...
By
Stephanie Zacharek
of Salon.com (7/0)
Like so many recent thrillers of this ilk, many of them in some way exploiting the 'innocence' of...
By
Mick LaSalle
of San Francisco Chronicle (7/0)
...genuine, not ironic or campy.
By
Sean McBride
of Sean the Movie Guy (7/0)
A creepy feel isn’t everything. A horror must be scary to be successful.
By
Sean Axmaker
of Seattle Post-Intelligencer (7/0)
...an emotionally haunting core.
By
Moira MacDonald
of Seattle Times (7/0)
A mostly faithful adaptation of a scary little story: A mother and her young daughter, needing to...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Rich Cline
of Shadows on the Wall (7/0)
The strong cast, intriguing visuals and subtle scripting keep things introspective and unsettling...
By
Nick Schager
of Slant Magazine (7/0)
A moldy, third-generation retread of The Ring.
By
Rob Blackwelder
of SPLICEDWire (7/0)
Torpid, trite and not the least bit scary — just unrelentingly unpleasant — (and) the most contem...
By
Rick Curnutte
of TheFilmJournal.com (Ohio) (7/0)
Salles' Dark Water abandoned what was an intriguing dramatic narrative and wasted it on what seem...
By
Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone
of TheMovieChicks.com (7/0)
The pacing is a little slow and the intensity needs to be cranked up a notch or two, but it has m...
By
Scott Nash
of Three Movie Buffs (7/0)
As a horror film, Dark Water is too much of a retread of recent films, but as a well-acted psycho...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Scott Nash
of Three Movie Buffs (7/0)
As a horror film, Dark Water is too much of a retread of recent films, but as a well-acted psycho...
By
Audrey Rock-Richardson
of Tooele Transcript-Bulletin (Utah) (7/0)
Pervasively chilling but never frightening.
By
Ken Fox
of TV Guide's Movie Guide (7/0)
An intelligent, brooding ghost story brimming with atmosphere, emotions and, above all else, wate...
By
Urban Cinefile Critics
of Urban Cinefile (7/0)
A top drawer cast working with a bottom drawer screenplay confirms my distaste for Japanese ‘girl...
By
Claudia Puig
of USA Today (7/0)
Dark Water has more substance and a more interesting look than many horror films, but the familia...
By
Matthew Turner
of ViewLondon (7/0)
A watered-down version of the Japanese original, Salles’s remake is still an enjoyable, atmospher...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Ed Halter
of Village Voice (7/0)
It fails to deliver the narrative thrill twists its origins would promise.
By
Willie Waffle
of WaffleMovies.com (7/0)
Sadly, you can't be sued for plagiarizing yourself
By
A. O. Scott
of New York Times (3/5) Login Required (Login Required)
A dull and occasionally risible remake...
By
Manohla Dargis
of New York Times (3/5) Login Required (Login Required)
A dull and occasionally risible remake of an even duller, more risible Japanese horror flick ...
By
Fred Topel
of About.com (3/4) No reference
Pretty much follows the formula of Japanese horror, but at least it does it with some involvement...
By
John Wirt
of Advocate (Baton Rouge, LA) (3/4) No reference
Brazilian director Walter Salles’ first Hollywood project is both a chilling ghost story and a he...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Jordan Reed
of Boxoffice Magazine (3/4) No reference
A tepid startle-fest, with fairly run-of-the-mill scares that leave no lasting impression.
By
Devin Faraci
of CHUD (6/1) No reference
Excruciating and less scary than a clogged up toilet, Dark Water should be allowed to quietly dra...
By
Pablo Villaca
of Cinema em Cena (3/4) No reference
Se você valoriza a construção consistente de um clima de melancolia e tensão, dificilmente se dec...
By
Robert Denerstein
of Denver Rocky Mountain News (3/4) No reference
Narrowly focused and appropriately claustrophobic, Dark Water creates believability by balancing ...
By
Jeff Vice
of Deseret News, Salt Lake City (6/1) No reference
This Americanized remake of a 2002 Japanese horror film can't make up its mind whether to be a dr...
By
Chuck O'Leary
of Fantastica Daily (3/4) No reference
Works best as a study of how a nice, beautiful woman is forced to deal with a succession of creep...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Michael Rechtshaffen
of Hollywood Reporter (6/1) No reference
With his stirring visual sense very much intact here, Salles sets the creepy mood eloquently, but...
By
Kit Bowen
of Hollywood.com (3/4) No reference
Although the film portends to be a creepy ghost story, you'll more than likely be bored to tears,...
By
James Sanford
of Kalamazoo Gazette (6/1) No reference
a throwback to the urban-paranoia thrillers of the late 1960s and the early 1970s, such as 'Rosem...
By
Robert W. Butler
of Kansas City Star (3/4) No reference
Despite a really good cast, the film never turns into the spine-tingler we expect.
By
Ella Taylor
of L.A. Weekly (3/4) No reference
No amount of tastefully desaturated color or imaginary friends going whoo-whoo in the deserted ap...
By
Colin Covert
of Minneapolis Star Tribune (3/4) No reference
Dark Water is a lesson in how to transform atmospheric J-horror into soggy B filmmaking.
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Jami Bernard
of New York Daily News (3/4) No reference
Seductively spooky.
By
Lou Lumenick
of New York Post (3/4) No reference
...doesn't exactly float much above mediocrity,...
By
Stephen Whitty
of Newark Star-Ledger (3/4) No reference
It's good to see [Salles] getting a chance to direct in Hollywood, and pleasant to have a scary m...
By
Gene Seymour
of Newsday (3/4) No reference
If there's such a thing as a film being too suggestive for too little, Dark Water may be its prot...
By
Roger Moore
of Orlando Sentinel (3/4) No reference
It's so lacking in heartfelt frights or cheap scares that the few real hair-raising moments, in t...
By
Gary Thompson
of Philadelphia Daily News (3/4) No reference
This whole down-tempo, static, kiddie doppelganger genre is just about out of steam, and even the...
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Carrie Rickey
of Philadelphia Inquirer (3/4) No reference
While his movie lacks the psychological resonance of Rosemary's Baby or The Sixth Sense, it easil...
By
Carla Meyer
of Sacramento Bee (6/1) No reference
[A] skillfully crafted psychological thriller.
By
Phoebe Flowers
of South Florida Sun-Sentinel (3/4) No reference
Salles takes an approach to building tension best described as methodical, which to many viewers ...
By
Josh Larsen
of Sun Publications (Chicago, IL) (3/4) No reference
...maintains a creepy vibe, mainly by emphasizing the sort of creepiness that exists on life's ed...
By
Angela Baldassarre
of Sympatico.ca (3/4) No reference
Dark Terror. Salles’ thriller this year’s best.
By
Mark Collette
of Tyler Morning Telegraph (Texas) (3/4) No reference
Salles' remake seems driven by an ailing liver.
Reviews of Dark Water
By
Jeffrey Chen
of Window to the Movies (3/4) No reference
A surprisingly faithful adaptation ... it has an identifiable human component that makes its sens...
By
Daniel M. Kimmel
of Worcester Telegram & Gazette (3/4) No reference
Dark Water holds your attention while viewing it, but doesn't fully resonate.
By
Glenn Whipp
of Los Angeles Daily News (3/4) Not Reachable
Dark Water may be long on atmosphere and short on genuine horror (or even surprises), but there a...
By
Connie Ogle
of Miami Herald (6/1) Not Reachable
What keeps the film alive and more than a little nerve-wracking are a terrific cast and director ...
By
James Berardinelli
of ReelViews (3/4) Not Reachable
...plenty of creepy moments, but few scares...
By
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
of St. Paul Pioneer Press (3/4) Not Reachable
Dark Water is based on one of those low-key Japanese chillers where there are a whole lot of pote...
Movie Distributors
Buena Vista Pictures Distribution Production Companies
Pandemonium
Vertigo Entertainment Movie Studios
Walt Disney Pictures
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