‘SLENDER MAN’ Trailer Uses All The Horror Tropes

The Slender Man legend is one of the oldest creepypasta stories around. So old that it feels like the Sony film revolving around this character feels stale on arrival. The trailer feels like one of those Funny or Die trailers without any type of punchline. While this feels like a total cash-in on the character, the question is, do fans of the story even care? Especially after the sad story that became a HBO documentary, Beware the Slenderman

You may remember that many people were trying to make a film adaptation out of The Slender Man but had many issues where many different people claimed they were the genesis of the character. In the Press Release I received, it seems like they nailed it down (or at least credited) to Victor Surge (which is a pseudonym of Eric Knudsen). Let’s watch the trailer, shall we?

OFFICIAL SYNOPSIS

In a small town in Massachusetts, four high school girls perform a ritual in an attempt to debunk the lore of SLENDER MAN. When one of the girls goes mysteriously missing, they begin to suspect that she is, in fact, HIS latest victim. 

The film seems like the typical supernatural boogeyman story that is only affecting attractive teens. The film is not yet rated but if I were a betting man (based off the subject matter and the desaturated/decolorized blood in the trailer), it’ll be PG-13 which, unfortunately, means that no risks will be taken here. The film has a very Verbinski The Ring look and feel to it. Part of that may be due to the French director, Sylvain White, lending a art-house approach to the film. If you don’t remember White, he directed I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer back in 2006 before following it up with the dance film, Stomp The Yard, that was trying to cash-in on that subgenre and finishing off that stretch with the comic adaptation of The Losers. Back in 2013, after the failure of The Losers, he directed the French thriller, La marque des anges (The Mark of the Angels) which I’ve heard decent things about. Since then, he’s been directing a lot of television.

I guess the only thing to look forward to on May 18th when the film is released in theaters is that Javier Botet (the obvious person to play the “monster) will be in the film to show off his bizarre physicality. Wake me up when this comes out and maybe I’ll give it a whirl.

SLENDER MAN is out in theaters nationwide on May 18, 2018