The Forest (PG-13)

My Rating: 60%

The Rotten Tomatoes: 12%

Audience Rating: 30%

To be honest, I probably should have learned my lesson of watching PG-13 rated horror movies after the absolutely horrid review I gave The Visit. Wow, that movie was unbelievably bad. But actually this one... was alright. I came into the movie with extremely low expectations, because I saw the review that The Rotten Tomatoes gave it, and I just thought: If this review is even worse than the review for The Visit, this movie has to be absolutely terrible. I almost didn't go. Of course though, I was dragged by one of my friends who is a horror fanatic, and I ended up going to see it with her. We both had very low expectations, and we were both very surprised with the result. This movie wasn't half bad, even though The Rotten Tomatoes said it was terrible, and also considering the fact that this was a January release. Believe me, all January release horror movies are absolutely terrible. But I guess that isn't true for all of them, because this one was... pretty okay.

I will give a quick spoiler-free summary of the movie: When Sara's twin sister who is visiting a forest in Japan disappears, she becomes determined to travel to the forest in Japan to find her. The forest where her twin became lost in is called the Aokigahara Forest, and just in case you're curious, yes, it is a real place that people have nicknamed, "the suicide forest." Anyways, Sara enters the forest with the help of a guide named Aiden, who continuously warned her to "stay on the path." Her investigation in the forest shows her a dark world where angry and tormented souls of the dead prey on those who dare to explore the forest.

Photo courtesy of ibtimes.com

One thing I really liked about this movie was there was a twist ending, which was awesome. Other then the ending though, you could kinda expect what was going to happen next. A character would say a classic horror movie line, and then something totally expected would happen next. But once again, quite impressive for being a January release movie. One thing I should mention to those planning on seeing it. If you read my review of The Visit, you know I disliked that movie for so many reasons, but the main reason was because it wasn't scary, and that was extremely disappointing. That movie was my first PG-13 rated horror movie, and I just got the impression that they were all like that. Well... I was definitely wrong. This movie was scary. I will even go to the lengths of saying that it was REALLY scary at some points. Which for me, was awesome. If you don't like that kind of stuff though and get scared easily... DON'T watch this movie. But if you're like me, and just want a good scare without feeling it's overdone... this movie is definitely for you. I know the reviews may look bad, but I gave it a chance, and it turned out to be worth the risk.