Dark Summer

Starring: Keir Gilchrist, Grace Phipps, & Peter Stormare 

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

The best actors in Hollywood need to get that big role before their career can take off. No matter how good they are, until they find that role, they won't be a household name and are forced to take whatever roles they can get. Even megastars, like Chris Pratt got his start on a low rated CW drama, and did B-movies for a decade before he was cast as Star Lord, this is the position Keir Gilchrist finds himself in now. Gilchrist is an exceptional young actor, who always gives his best, but without that big role on his resume, he's forced to take jobs like this one. Dark Summer follows Daniel, (Gilchrist) a 17 year old who has recently been sentenced to house arrest for stalking a girl from his school. To make matters worse, his parents are away for the summer and Daniel is all alone. As boredom ware away at him mind, Daniel starts to see things and wonders if he's being punished for his crimes by some supernatural entity, or if he's just going insane from boredom. For much of this movie, the actor is bored, and if the actor is bored, what do you think the audience is feeling? Daniel's days are filled with monotonous discussions with friends, who sneak over, and of course investigations that turn up nothing. As for his nights, they are filled with a lot of jump scares and loud noises that again ultimately turn up nothing, as Dark Summer is just one of those films where nothing happens until the last twenty minutes, and by then, who really cares anymore? The bottom line, even a great actor couldn't save this film, it's your typical supernatural horror film, filled with a lot of jump scares, good looking people, and a whole lot of nothing else until the very end.