Alistair Lawrence Common Sense Media Jun 30, 2022 1/5

This haunted house horror has all the ingredients for a decent supernatural thriller but ends up overcooking all of them.

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Matt Brunson Film Frenzy Dec 18, 2019 1.5/4

Nothing even remotely interesting occurs.

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Felix Vasquez Jr. Cinema Crazed Apr 29, 2009

There's the draw from the audience of potential scares and the good cast, but there's nothing ever delivered to us.

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Mark Halverson Sacramento News & Review Aug 7, 2008 1/5

This baffling, unintentionally sidesplitting horror show has opened just in time to qualify as the worst film of the year.

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David Nusair Reel Film Reviews Jun 22, 2007 .5/4

...ultimately comes off as nothing less than a total disaster.

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Ken Fox TV Guide Jan 8, 2007 2/4

All of this, of course, would be forgivable if it added up to a scary movie or made even a lick of sense (chunks appear to have been cut out of a longer cut of the film), but Balaguero manages to disappoint on every possible front.

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J. R. Jones Chicago Reader Jan 8, 2007

As in most bad horror flicks, intimations of unspeakable evil are supposed to distract us from the yawning gaps in story logic and character motivation.

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Nathan Rabin AV Club Sep 26, 2005

A plodding, portentous horror thriller in which a spooky child figures prominently and people speak in hushed tones about sinister doings.

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Jeremy C. Fox Pajiba Sep 16, 2005

Darkness is a by-the-numbers haunted house thriller that recalls a number of other films in which a family moves into a mysterious old manse with a sordid past

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Kevin Carr 7M Pictures Sep 2, 2005 2.5/5

There's still a lot of European feel to Darkness, which can sometimes be off-putting to American audiences.

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Michael Dequina TheMovieReport.com Jul 7, 2005 2/4

Too many plot and character lapses for comfort, even in the traditionally logic-flouting horror genre.

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Bill Clark FromTheBalcony Jun 15, 2005 D-

It's unfortunate that the film is called Darkness because this means it will soon be relegated to the Wal Mart bargain bin next to 2003's stinker Darkness Falls.

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Jeffrey M. Anderson Combustible Celluloid Jun 10, 2005 2.5/4

A good case of style over substance.

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Nick Schager Lessons of Darkness May 30, 2005 D

There's nothing very frightening about this shallow, stupid spookfest.

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John J. Puccio Movie Metropolis Apr 22, 2005 4/10

The movie finally degenerates into a hopeless mass of mumbo-jumbo, silliness, and incoherence.

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Matthew Turner ViewLondon Apr 2, 2005 2/5

However, the fact that the creepy suspenseful atmosphere builds up to a risible climax where nothing remotely scary happens undermines all the good work that has gone before.

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Dave Alexander Rue Morgue Magazine Mar 23, 2005

Darkness is a ridiculous film choked with genre clichs and stolen scares, yet there's something genuinely dark and nasty wrapped inside all that ridiculousness...

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Robert Strohmeyer Filmcritic.com Feb 22, 2005 1.5/5

incomprehensibly opaque and moronically over-projected

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Matt Caracappa Boxoffice Magazine Jan 16, 2005 1.5/5

Tries to survive on an aura of unknown creepiness, but that's really just a nice way of saying that very little happens of any interest during the film.

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Pam Grady Reel.com Jan 15, 2005 1/4

This is one movie that's definitely dead on arrival.

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