Saw 'Stickman', being fond of horror regardless of budget (even if not my favourite genre) and being intrigued somewhat by the idea. Being behind on my film watching and reviewing, with a long to watch and review list that keeps getting longer, it took me a while to get round to watching and reviewing it.Giving 'Stickman' a fair chance with being interest and apprehension, it turned out to be far better than expected. Won't say that 'Stickman' is a great film because it isn't and the potential, while not wasted, is not fully lived up to. Considering the large number of films seen recently being mediocre and less and wasting potential, was expecting worse and was relieved that while wanting in a fair few areas it was actually one of my better recent low-budget viewings.'Stickman' started off quite well, the first twenty minutes or so starting the film off on a promising, unsettling and atmospheric note that really does intrigue. Production values did have some eeriness and nowhere near as cheap as expected, and the music, which not the most memorable in the world, didn't detract from the atmosphere. The setting is effectively spooky and some of the lead acting at times was not bad. There are spooky and suspenseful moments and it isn't dull. The direction doesn't feel phoned in and the storytelling in the first half does intrigue.However, the story was severely wanting in the second half after starting off promisingly. It is very disjointed and after the promising start the final third especially loses atmosphere, one loses interest and things start to not make sense. Too much of the film is vague and doesn't explore some elements and story strands enough, some dropped soon after being introduced, go nowhere or serve much point.Ending is unsatisfying, on top of feeling hasty there are too many loose ends hanging in the air. Got the sense that the writers didn't know how to end the film. Would have liked much more tension and suspense, scares could have been more consistent and some weren't surprising enough. Found too the script to lack natural flow and with a fair bit of cheese going on, and the characters bland with some adopting some annoying and not always logical decision making. The support acting is even more problematic than the second half's storytelling, at best it was poor and too often terrible.Overall, better than expected but not great still. 5/10 Bethany Cox

I'm typically a fan of SyFy made-for-TV movies. Stickman, however, was terrifying for all the wrong reasons. The atmosphere was creepy and the creature was well done, so this could have been a great creature-feature. But, alas, this movie suffers from extremely poor writing. Just a few of the inconsistencies/nonsensical aspects of this movie: 1. If the poem is what summons the Stickman, why on earth was Emma carrying it around with her everywhere she went? Seriously?! If she knew if summoned an evil entity, shouldn't she have enough sense to destroy the piece of paper with the poem on it? I guess not. 2. Obviously, death scenes are the best part of horror movies....Unless you're talking about this movie. When the two women running the boarding house (the only adults conveniently) are killed Emma's first night at said boarding house...Well, it was very anticlimactic indeed. And then the 5 other girls boarding in said house don't bother calling the police even though they know Emma was locked in a psych ward for 7 years for killing her mom and sister. I just face-palmed at that entire scene. 3. Thinking the movie would turn around and get better, I kept watching. No such luck. Emma and two of the other girls drives back to Woodbury for 'answers' and, conveniently, there has been an escapee from the psych ward so they easily get in. I watch a lot of horror, so I understand defying belief, but common on! And, just to point out another wrinkle in the writing, why did she have to go back to Woodbury for answers when, earlier in the movie, she said she could trap the Stickman by drawing his picture? Why not just, I don't know, try drawing his picture? That seems a lot easier. But what do I know? And...that's where the movie ended for me. I just couldn't finish it. Believe me, this is a very rare thing for me to turn off a horror movie prematurely.

RELEASED TO TV IN 2017 and written & directed by Sheldon Wilson, "Stickman" chronicles events when a 7 year-old girl is accused of murdering her mother & sister and put in a mental institution. She's finally released ten years later and finds residence at a halfway house for girls. Unfortunately, the evil spirit that slew her kin is on the loose again and threatens all the girls at her new residence. A few of them travel back to the hospital to find a way to put an end to the creature's reign of terror.There's a lot of good in this flick: The filmmaking is proficient for a TV-budgeted movie; the locations are decent, which include the asylum, the transitional home, and points in between, like the town and the woods (there are several cool shots of a truss bridge in the dark); it's nice to have a black protagonist for a change (Hayley Law); the five other girls at the halfway house are all regular lasses with no stereotypical "hottie," although a few of them COULD have played that role (e.g. Sara Garcia, Sarah Fisher, Zoé De Grand Maison, etc.).In addition, the film successfully creates a spooky ambiance here and there, e.g. in the woods near the psyche facility; and the demon is pretty effective for a CGI monster, coming across as a meshing of the demon from "Scarecrow" (2013), the aliens in "Signs" (2002) and maybe Freddy Krueger (i.e. the claws).Unfortunately, I didn't buy the premise behind the creature, which came across as half-baked gobbledygook; the poem that unleashes the demon reads like it was written by a 13 year-old and the climatic explanation didn't resolve the overall ill-conceived impression. This naturally hinders the movie from being engaging; it limits the thrust of events and therefore suspense.Note to emerging filmmakers: Work the kinks out of your premise BEFORE making the movie. The director, Sheldon Wilson, needs to work on his scriptwriting skills because the movies he writes tend to be problematic story-wise ("The Hollow," "The Night Before Halloween," "Neverknock" and this one) while his movies written by others can be quite good for TV-budgeted flicks ("Mothman," "Red, Werewolf Hunter" and the aforementioned "Scarecrow," which is excellent).Lastly, the final scene is predictably lame. Still, there's enough good here to make "Stickman" worthwhile for those who appreciate these kinds of flicks.THE FILM RUNS about 89 minutes. There's no info on where it was shot, but since this is a Canadian production it might've been somewhere outside Toronto.GRADE: C

We have all seen that horror movie where some dumb girlfriend goes into the creepy dark monster dungeon looking for her equally dumb boyfriend who was just killed by the monster only to be killed by the very same monster as punishment for being dumb. That is this movie, so you have already seen this movie. If I had to write a 2 page essay on the topic of what was unique about this movie, I would receive a failing grade. There is pretty much no question that this is a somewhat late attempt to cash in on the slenderman meme. If I had to describe the personalities of the lead characters in this film, the phrase "very afraid and doesn't want to die" would be used repeatedly. Many characters literally have no distinguishing personality traits beyond that. At least in crappy 80s horror there would be the jock and the bimbo and the nerd and the coward etc. Different characters to create some variety and keep that character interactions dynamic. The monster itself is a cartoon and the practical effects were basically the bare minimum (blood splatter, corpse without its head, etc.). Expect a lot of off screen deaths.