Movies
The Children (The Day)
“The Children has it all and is guaranteed to please even the hardest to satisfy horror fan… [while it’s] an incredibly well shot and suspenseful film, it’s also insanely violent…”
Spoilers Follow
Taking its cue from classic horror films like Who Can Kill a Child? and The Bad Seed comes the UK horror flick The Children, a fresh take on a subgenre frowned upon here the States, where children aren’t the cute little tykes we thought they were…
In the film directed by Tom Shankland, a bunch of kids have flu-like symptoms, which evolve into a more sinister problem.
While the recently released UK film of the same nature, Eden Lake, is widely praised among critics and horror fans, I consider the pic to be a bust on many levels — and where Lake fails, The Children thrives. Written by Tom Shankland and Paul Andrew Williams, The Children doesn’t attempt to over explain the situation at hand, which keeps it not only more believable, but extra creepy. The idea that your loving kids could turn on you and your family without any reason whatsoever is downright terrifying. To even think that a child could be capable of some of the terror they raise in this film is even more insane.
But the true bliss of this wonderfully executed horror flick is an idea that’s teased throughout the entirety of the events of that fateful afternoon; could you hit, let alone kill your own child to preserve your own life? During the climax (watch the scene here) one of the parents is sitting back against the door yielding a fire poker while two kids slowly creep towards her. Behind the door her daughter is screaming, kicking and punching, trying to help save her mother. She’s yelling at her mother through the door to do something, while she exclaims back something along the lines of, “I can’t”. She simply drops guard, because she’d rather die than kill a child. That moment beautifully defines the entire film in a nutshell.
While the question of whether or not you could kill a child is a dark one that’s been asked dozens of times, it’s the suspense that Shankland delivers that makes The Children something quite spectacular and worthy of being called one of the best of it’s nature. He tinkers and toys with the audience by giving us the lowdown on the situation at hand, but keeps the adults in the dark creating a gigantic level of suspense. We know what’s coming, but they haven’t the slightest clue…
But that’s not enough to satisfy the average gore-hound, and Shankland knows it. While The Children is an incredibly well shot and suspenseful film, it’s also insanely violent. It’s quite admirable to see that Shankland took a chance with child violence and doesn’t shy away from it at all. Here in the States it’s nearly impossible to sell a movie, let lone get it past the MPAA if there are children harmed, yet Shankland slams it out of the park and doesn’t give a sh*t. These children take a beating, as do the parents. What’s even more shocking is their age; these kids are like 6, maybe 7 years old.
The Children has it all and is guaranteed to please even the hardest to satisfy horror fan. Simply put down your copy of Eden Lake, stomp on it a few times and move on to something that’s actually scary and carries redeemable qualities (instead of just trying to “shock” you). The Children will be one of this year’s direct-to-DVD gems that you’ll hold a cherish for years to come. Don’t miss out… and don’t have any children (your friends weren’t joking).
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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