Wicked Little Things (2006) – Rated R

“When a grieving widow moves her two daughters to a rustic house in the Pennsylvania mountains, she hopes the solitude will help them work through feelings of abandonment. But they hardly have time to reflect, as they discover unexpected neighbors. As it turns out, the ghosts of children who were killed in a tragic accident more than 90 years before are still “playing” in the mine shaft nearby, and would love to have the neighborhood kids join them.”

“Are we lost? We’ve been walking for a really long time.” – “No baby – we’re just a little turned around.”

Wicked Little Things is a mashup of two of my favorite horror subgenres – the killer kid movie (The Exorcist, The Omen series) and the zombie film.

Lori Heuring stars as the recently widowed Karen, moving to a new home in rural Pennsylvania left her by her husband. I do have to say that when I arrive at my new house and in place of electricity there are rats, I would turn around and head back (I am spoiled that way). Her daughters are played by Scout Taylor-Compton and Chloe Grace Moretz.

Scout Taylor-Compton assays the standard role of the angry, sullen, whiny teenage daughter Sara. She has since become something of a scream queen nabbing the role of Laurie Strode in the two Halloween movies made by Rob Zombie as well as appearing in the April Fool’s Day remake and 247 Degrees. Both Lori and Scout do a fine job but are clearly shown up by 9-year old Chloe Moretz.

Chloe Moretz is one of my absolute favorite child actors. Her portrayal here of Emma shows a lot of the potential she had in her more recent, juicier roles. Her turns in Let Me In and Kick-Ass were fantastic and were the best things in those films. She gets to be much more natural here as she is neither a vampire nor a superhero but the role is not as showy either.

The supporting cast is ably rounded out by character actor and Clint Eastwood regular Geoffrey Lewis and Ben (Chariots of Fire) Cross. The rest of the cast have names that end in v or va pointing to this being filmed in Eastern Europe – presumably these are the various non-speaking children.

That said Bulgaria does a fine job subbing in for the more expensive to film in Pennsylvania. Cinematography is fine which is good as the vast majority of the film is shot at night and mostly outdoors. There is one beautifully lit chase across a foggy field. A warning though – the film is quite gory in parts.