msalget
...was when the demonic child called Bradley Cooper's character facile and smug.
blumdeluxe
"Case 39" tells the story of a family worker who has to handle a tough case when a young girl nearly gets murdered by her parents. She decides to grant the child a home and takes good care of her, but more and more she gets the feeling that her newly acclaimed daughter could be a lot less innocent than she had previously though.This film is one of a typical genre of titles that include innocent-looking yet demonic small children. As most of them, you can easily adopt the feelings of the threatened lead character. On the other hand the film is very predictable and with some experience you can tell what will happen not more than ten minutes into the plot. It is obvious that the title had some budget and therefor the special effects look decent. The acting, too, seems appropriate and makes this one of the better movies of the genre, without saying that it is an excellent film.All in all this is a genre film for people who are looking for exactly this kind of entertainment. Personally, I'm not really into demonic horror because it is never all too plausible, but as easy entertainment for one evening, this is clearly good enough.
jacklmauro
Seeing this on TV a few times now (thank you, SyFy channel) has disturbed me. That is, for the first time, I'm extremely impressed by Zellweger. I am drawn to any flick in which the monster is a kid, mainly because such scenarios so invert norms and amplify a horror film. But what really gives this movie weight is RZ's performance (while the demon girl is quite good as well). It is exactly right, particularly when she spots the little witch who should be burning in the house. Another actress would have overplayed the moment, but Zellweger understands how her character has had to confront the unearthly with this beast before. I would add that the scene between Cooper and the girl is also strong, as he just barely conveys the character's sudden awareness of what he is actually facing. All in all, a nice little scare film, and a brava to Renee.
Danii Disaster
I can't look past the fact that Bridget Jones (Renee Zellweger) was cast for a serious role. Would the movie be better is someone else played the lead? Maybe a little, but I doubt it very much. It's just not that good a movie to begin with.In any case, Zellweger was a poor choice. She should stick to romcoms, I think. I can't take her seriously in a role like this. To add insult to injury, the little girl was godawful, too. While Zellweger looked constipated throughout the movie, the little girl was just awkward and kind of embarrassing to watch - she was not one bit scary. Her performance could best be described as "trying too hard, but failing miserably". With lots of child actors around, it beats me why they'd pick this talent-less brat. Basically, the acting by both leads was less than convincing to put it mildly.The movie itself is a (very poor) rehash of all the other Satan-child / evil kid movies I have seen. Not really a thriller, let alone horror. I don't know what genre it falls under, but it's just neither suspenseful, nor griping, and not one bit scary or disturbing.If they wanted to make something memorable out of this movie, they should have let alone the horror theme and, perhaps, explored the girls life as though she wasn't aware that she's evil or that she didn't want to do what her nature dictated and was fighting the evil within. Now that would of made for a much better story, I think.But this banal, done-do-death, clichéd mess? What was the point? If you want far superior movies with a similar theme, try the original "Omen" (not the remake with Julia Styles), or "Orphan".
