This review has been ‘repurposed’ from my other site, theOneliner.com

My theory, completely unsupported by any of those bothersome ‘facts’, is that David Goyer writes good films for other people in return for being allowed to write and direct his own pish horrors. I saw this because a man who wrote the Blade series and the new Batman films clearly can’t be completely without talent, yet The Unborn is quite massively pish.

There is a plot, I suppose, or at least some excuse for the stuff that’s parading in front of us to hang together in a way resembling a film. Sadly, it involves Nazi experimentation, lost souls attempting to possess people from the netherrealm, exorcism and massive amounts of pish, so it’s difficult for me to even pretend to care about it enough to relate it in ways that hide my contempt for it.

In real terms, this The Unborn amounts to a young girl suddenly being bothered by the spirit-child type thing that’s been haunting her family for a while with tragic consequences. In even realer terms, this amounts to trying to find shock value and thrills aplenty by occasionally showing us a child so pale that it’s either anaemic or auditioning for Kiss Juniors.

Adding this already torpedoed nonsense to effects work that’s often outright laughable and scenery crewing performances from all involved and we’re left with an hour and a half you won’t get back and a puddle of pish.

Now, I should perhaps say that as a committed atheist any supernatural horror is facing less of an uphill struggle and more of a sheer cliff face. As soon as hell or spectoral planes are mentioned my steampunk bullshit detectors start making this annoying clanking noise and then I can’t focus on what’s going on.

That in mind, is this really any more poorly written than any other supernatural horror? Perhaps not, but at the end of the day it’s still expecting me to be frightened of a pasty-faced six year old and it still genuinely thinks that the phrase “Jumby wants to be born now” will inspire terror in my fragile little heart.

Pish.