Instant Favorite.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Dark Mirror (2007): The Good, the Bad and the Reflective Synopsis: A husband and wife, along with their young son, move into a new house that has a dark past. An old secret that lingers in the glass and mirrors of the house must be revealed before it is too late.The Good: The story is a somewhat intriguing one, even if it is clumsily executed. The idea is that "entities" can get trapped within glass or mirrors. Okay, that's kind of a cool idea. Not completely original, but yeah... we can work with that. The additional concept added is that of the protagonist, being a fledgling photographer, inadvertently captures the entity in her camera lens when she (rather inexplicably) takes a photo of her bathroom mirror. (Not sure I ever figured out why she was taking a picture of her bathroom mirror.... high def selfie?) Despite the fact that the story dissolves from here for me, the concept is quite interesting. The woman realizes, all too late, that if she takes a photo of someone, they wind up dead. Somehow the flash releases(?) the entity and they die. A lot could have been done with this idea, but the director's script and execution burdens the movie's progress of the idea. Sadly, you are left with a good concept and nothing more.The Bad: The movie is a slow burner, which can be good if the film is moving forward with solid character development. That, unfortunately, doesn't happen. The protagonist wife sees all the creepy stuff in the mirrors, while the husband is painted as the nauseatingly typical "it's all in your mind" horror stereotype. Even when shown things that cannot be explained and the Average Joe husband would say, "Wow, that is some abnormal junk right there", he shrugs it off and allows for the wife to become further "in this by herself". It's a tired device for allowing more of the overly used "OMG... I just saw a dark figure in the window" tricks. Used over and over in the movie for cheap "scares" that don't work, it exhausts the movie far too early and you are left caring little for the ending... you just want it to end. And it's too bad, because the ending is somewhat clever. The problem is that it takes far too long to set up the reasoning for all the happenings. See, the true story is that the house was owned by an artist who was passing his wife's paintings as his own and their deaths are the source of the evil entity. Nice little plot, however, they spend far too long on the protagonist figuring this all out that it ultimately loses any effect it may have had on the viewer. Kind of a shame. For me, this movie got bogged down by trying to do too much and even with so much to do, still found a way to be boring. That is a script issue and the reason it gets a "4" from me.The Reflective: The word "reflective" is a bit of an oxymoron in the context of this movie, because while the film centers around reflections and windows and mirrors, the director never reflected on how boring and obtrusive his script was turning out. The tone of the whole movie just felt too much like something made for the Lifetime channel. The pacing was horrible and just when something interesting would happen, the director would slow it right back down. The problem has less to do with the idea (which should drive the movie) and more do with the direction, flow and execution of the idea. There was real promise at some point when this idea was being fleshed out, but the director ruined it by trying to turn this into something too cerebral for its own good. The result is a movie I'd obviously never watch again and in a few weeks, I will have forgotten entirely that I ever did watch it.

This disaster of a movie has nothing to recommend. While the actors try hard enough there is little they can do with such a nonsensical script. The plot – what plot? After looking at 14 other houses the female lead is attracted to this one which seems to give her an orgasm just looking around it. From there it's all downhill. For anyone with an IQ of seven or less this will probably be an attractive thing to watch, else wise it is a turkey.The direction is poor, the photography is appalling and thumps and gurgles that are substituted for 'music' really turn this shocker into an ordeal to sit through, torture at the top end of the scale. Miss this if you can ...

This third-rate rip-off of The Shining (and about two dozen other horror thrillers) trucks out every conceivable cliché one can imagine. As far as the story about insufferable yuppies moving into a house in which strange goings-on are going on, we've seen this all before...and done much better than this derivative turkey. Too bad. This is actually an interesting premise but it's all handled so poorly with little imagination or originality. The characters are so cardboard and annoying- especially the I'm-too-sexy-for-myself neighbor- one almost hopes they get clocked! Just when we think the film is about to partially redeem itself with a satisfying conclusion, it's a let-down. Don't waste your time.

Few things are more frustrating than a horror film that fails to do right by its premise. "Dark Mirror" has a lot going for it initially: an earthy, expressive lead actress (the wonderful Lisa Vidal), a contemporary haunted house plot with lots of potential, and a cast of strange neighbors and red herrings. Unfortunately, after a pretty good start that has Vidal, her dull, stiff of a husband and their bland son moving into a new home and things going wrong right away, the movie develops a case of "the stupids." Vidal and husband clearly have some domestic issues they're working through, but to goose up the suspense the writers see fit to have him doubt every little thing she says from the start to an annoying degree. "I know that woman!" Vidal says when she sees the face of a missing person on TV. "Are you sure?" says supportive husband. What? Wouldn't the natural response be something like "Really, you met this woman? Maybe we should tell someone." I know he's supposed to think she is losing it, but we as an audience need some normalcy before they jump into later plot points that should develop over the course of the film. As the film progresses and the wife grows increasingly certain that the house is haunted, the number of these kind of exchanges grow tiresomely frequent. Another complaint: The movie can't make up its mind what it wants to be and as such makes little sense. Part ghost story (what's with the ghost mom who is of no help?), part sleuthing mystery (the story behind the former owners of the house not only remains unsolved but the motivations don't connect with the puzzle), and what's with the Chinese spirituality and its complete lack of connection with the mysterious artist theme and her Latina roots?SPOILERSAs "Dark Mirror" moves towards its big reveal in the latter scenes, the overall shock is undermined by the dumb actions of the characters. The husband suspects the wife is losing her mind and possibly a homicidal maniac, but he thinks nothing of leaving their defenseless and easily spooked child alone with her as he puts in fourteen hour work days where he apparently keeps his fingers crossed that she won't murder any of the neighbors before he comes home.Also, the cops in their neighborhood are so inept they must be the LAPD...several people die within feet of this household and no one questions the housewife who is there all day and might have seen something. Really, at the end there is this laugh out loud scene when an inspector enters a bloody bedroom, examines the damage and then has to have the blood trail pointed out to him...a two foot wide trail of blood virtually blocking the entryway he obviously had to step over to get into the room. Incredible.On the plus side, I gotta say I can't fault Lisa Vidal with anything. She is a wonderfully natural actress and actually makes her virtual nothing role into something interesting. She is the only reason I was even motivated to stick around for the conclusion."Dark Mirror" is just another one of the recent slate of horror films that are all concept and no brains.