Stephen T. Kay's stylish thriller, BOOGEYMAN, takes one of horror's mythical figures and transports him into the 21st century. Though Tim Jensen (Barry Watson) is a successful magazine editor with a beautiful girlfriend (Tory Mussett), his childhood continues to haunt him. When he was only eight years old, Tim watched his father get eaten by the Boogeyman, or at least that's how he remembers it. Of course, no one believed him then--not even his mother (Lucy Lawless), who has just recently passed away. Wracked with guilt for not having been there to say goodbye, Tim decides to spend the night in his childhood home and confront the Boogeyman once and for all. But before that happens, he reunites with his old friend Kate (Emily Deschanel) and meets a young girl (Skye McCole Bartusiak) who is holding onto a dark secret of her own.Kay and cinematographer Bobby Bukowski pack BOOGEYMAN with enough tension for several films, finding terror in every doorknob and around every corner. Watson and Deschanel deliver grounded performances even as the supernatural insanity swirls around them. The result is a work that relies more on shocks and thrills than actual blood and guts in order to frighten its audience.
