Dimension

First off, I can't tell you how Phantoms compares to the original novel by Dean Koontz as I've never read the book. What I can tell you is that Phantoms is worlds better than director Joe Chappelle's last film, Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers. In Phantoms, a pair of sisters visit the small town where one currently lives. The town is seemingly empty, until they discover some corpses and strange things begin happening. The film's first half sets up a great creepy atmosphere. But like many other stories where an 'ultimate evil' is present (Stephen King's It comes to mind), the discovery of what's actually behind the evil is very anticlimactic. (And the previews for the film may have given a little too much away.)

Phantoms is well made, and generates a nice mysterious tone for a while. The highlights of the film include a great creepy turn by Liev Schreiber and a spooky silent, motionless dog (watch the movie) that somehow seems twice as scary as a vicious, gnarling canine like Cujo. A pleasant diversion, not a classic.

B+