The Empty Man (2020)

 

 

'The Empty Man' is the directorial debut of David Prior and is based upon the graphic novel of the same name by Boom! Studios. It stars James Badge Dale as a man who begins searching for his friend's lost daughter and uncovering a sinister cult with dark plans for him. 

This film was shelved back in 2017 by 20th Century Fox which is now a part of the Walt Disney Company who I guess felt they could get a few bucks out of some patrons during this dry bones Halloween season. After watching the film, I can completely understand why the film was ultimately shelved until now, and that's because it makes you ask "How can I possibly market this film?". I'm gonna be upfront and say that I have neither read nor even heard of this graphic novel before sitting down to watch this flick, and in what seems like a first I went in completely blind with no prior research to see if I could critique the film better and I feel that had I seen the poster and marketing beforehand, I'd be more angry I think.

'The Empty Man' simply lacks an identity. It doesn't know what it wants to be so it throws cinematic crap at the wall to see which sticks, which spoiler alert is none of them. The beginning shows promise with an eerie atmosphere and set somewhere in Tibet as a group of mountain climbers seem to unleash a curse or spiritual entity of some kind setting up a simple premise that can be built upon if done right. We then jump ahead where the film suddenly becomes a hybrid of 'Ring' and films of the slasher genre with the titular spirit bumping off some teens in quick fashion.

We then drop that subplot and suddenly we are now in a 'Wicker Man' or 'Midsommar' cult horror film until we arrive at an incoherent science fiction climax that I won't spoil but it hardly matters. I expect most folks to be ready to pack up long before then. Now that I've savaged the movie so harshly I will say that the film does some things right. Like I said, the prologue was very well done and effectively creepy and while the story goes off the rails from there, it does retain that creep factor for most of the running time. I also have to again praise composer Christopher Young, who is a favorite among horror directors with his most famous film of course being 'Hellraiser'.

'The Empty Man' is likely a better read than it is presented here and I will likely catch up with it long before I sit through this one again. This is just another one of Fox's sad leftovers in a sea of leftovers brought over from the Disney merger. Do yourselves a favor and look for the scares somewhere else this Halloween.

D-