I have read every book the horror genius, that is James Herbert, has ever written. It was a very sad day when he passed to the other side and to be honest, I do not think it is possible to convert any of his books, realistically, to a movie format; although possibly the best and truest to the book from which it came was "Haunted (1995)" although while not a good port from the book I also enjoyed "The Survivor (1981)".
There is really no way in hell (pardon the pun) that any movie can take the atmosphere, character development, story development, and creative horror genius that exists in the writing of JH (Who incidentally, I rate above Stephen King and even Clive Barker as the best horror writer of all time). What can I say? I have read all the books and never been disappointed with any from the Rats to the final Ash novel, he will be sadly missed.
As for the movie, who does not like Jeffrey Dean Morgan? From TWD and his masterful performance as Neegan to his role in this, he never disappoints and to be fair, although the movie really does not do the book any justice, how can it? It would take a series to convert any James Herbert Novel to the silver screen but the problem with this is that it is not really very scary and the horror is somewhat tame with a really poor ending that feels so rushed, it really leaves the viewer feeling rather cheated!
It is unfair to compare any movie to the book it was taken from, so I am merely reviewing this impartially as an honest review of a new horror film without pointing out where the book differs or criticising it based on that and so I am giving it a fair 6 hatchets out of 10 on the horror scale - JDM elevates it above the base average 5 stars it would have been without him!
