The defence The Arthouse Gremlin
“Its refusal to behave is the point.”
The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.
Back to trending 
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
Horror · Mystery · 2019
Mill Valley, Pennsylvania, Halloween night, 1968. After playing a joke on a school bully, Stella and her friends decide to sneak into a supposedly haunted house that once belonged to the powerful Bellows family, unleashing dark forces that they will be unable to control.
Movie details
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
“They're not just stories anymore.”
2019 Horror · Mystery 1h 48m
Critical arithmetic
One number, for now.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
TMDB
6.5 / 10
Community rating
Mill Valley, Pennsylvania, Halloween night, 1968. After playing a joke on a school bully, Stella and her friends decide to sneak into a supposedly haunted house that once belonged to the powerful Bellows family, unleashing dark forces that they will be unable to control.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark?
For the defence
The Arthouse Gremlin
“The stranger, the better.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Popcorn Loyalist
“Big screen, big feelings, no apologies.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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Fear Street: 1978
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In 1978, two rival groups at Camp Nightwing must band together to solve a terrifying mystery when horrors from their towns' history come alive.
The Boogeyman
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In the Mouth of Madness
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An insurance investigator visits a small town while looking into the strange disappearance of a popular horror novelist. He soon finds that the impact of the author’s books is far more than inspirational.
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
André Øvredal
Written by
Kevin Hageman · Dan Hageman
Zoe Colletti
Stella Nicholls
Dean Norris
Roy Nicholls
Michael Garza
Ramón Morales
Gabriel Rush
Auggie Hilderbrandt
Gil Bellows
Chief Turner
Natalie Ganzhorn
Ruth Steinberg
Austin Abrams
Tommy Milner
Court is in session
Put Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist
“Oddness is not depth.”
A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.