Picture a very dark take on the "The Thing and I" segment from The Simpsons' "Treehouse of Horror VII", mix in a sinister mom (Lizzy Caplan) and dad (Antony Starr), and tack on a final act that has the style and energy of your average supernatural short film. What you now have is "Cobweb", director Samuel Bodin's engaging but utterly unremarkable horror movie revolving around a young boy (Woody Norman), the voice he hears in his home's walls, and the mystery of his parents' potentially murderous past. There are very few scares to be had here and there's a sense of been-there-done-that to most of what the movie serves up, but it's hard to deny the quality of the movie's angular shots and use of shadows and dark spaces -- even if it's in the service of a story that's as fresh as your average corpse. Also hard to deny: Cleopatra Coleman's presence as substitute teacher Miss Devine, who resolves to come to her student Peter's aid when suspicions rise that things are unravelling at home. I need to see more horror movies with her in them, please. I also wouldn't mind seeing what else Samuel Bodin can do when given more original material.
