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Parents' Guide to

Slender Man

By Jeffrey Anderson, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 14+

Cheap-looking movie squanders spooky internet monster.

Movie PG-13 2018 93 minutes
Slender Man Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

age 13+

Based on 26 parent reviews

age 11+
sure this movie is about a killer who lives in the woods, but i still give it 5 stars,
age 15+

The most manly

Maybe the late release was to blame for this bomb. If it was the early 2010s with Slender Man stories on early Youtube Slender Man would had been a big sleeper hit.

This title has:

Too much violence
Too much sex
Too much consumerism

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (26 ):
Kids say (42 ):

Based on a viral 2009 internet meme that gave plenty of people the creeps, this lazy horror movie is filled with stale, worn-out scares, crude effects and jump scares, and poor storytelling. Despite the opportunity to feature a genuinely scary central figure, Slender Man feels like a hundred other horror movies -- basically anything that involves people's curiosity getting them into trouble. Its other problem is that it was deliberately edited to earn a PG-13 rating, so it doesn't really have any scares beyond the usual loud percussion noise whenever the monster appears.

Director Sylvain White films everything in dimly lit rooms, especially a library and a hospital; maybe he was trying to use the smeary grayness to cover up the movie's shoddy digital effects. The rhythms are off, too, with every attempt at a spooky reveal occurring either too fast or too slow. The one thing Slender Man does right is that it actually conveys a sense of loss among the characters. They actually care about one another, and they're deeply affected by the disappearances and other troubles. King, specifically, is a spunky, feisty standout; she's the only one who seems to feel real fear, and she gives a little extra in her performance.

Movie Details

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