Theres nothing path-breaking about Goosebumps, but it never bores. Theres an old-fashioned playfulness to the horror scenes, and frankly I thought there were more laughs than scares. Im going with three out of five. Its one of those films that the family can watch together. Not a bad way to spend two hours.

the film lurches between comedy and horror, none makes an impact but for the €œAbominable Snowman€, and thats only because he gets solo screen space. The film even takes a swing at Stephen King, and goes on to shoot one scene of Stine punching away at a typewriter under a banner that says The Shining. And yet, King is everywhere. Including at a school dance much like Carrie, where horror lurks nearby, that goes unacknowledged. The film apparently has Stines approval. Its hard to see why.

Stine and his books get a new lease of life in this charming tribute film.€‹ To have Slappy, arguably the most menacing villain of the series, leading the pack of baddies was a clever move. As the dummy tromps off in a car €‹emblazoned with the word €‹HAUNTED in€‹ place of €‹a€‹ number plate, releasing one monster after another, €‹Goosebumps maintains its breakneck speed amidst the lunacy. €‹€‹€‹The film, with the well-mounted CG villains – the werewolf, the abominable snowman, body squeezers – and its hair-raising playfulness, is a pleasure ride.

As a standard children’s adventure, this one is interesting enough but the horror part just doesn’t stick. Darren Lemke, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski who together adapted the stories to screenplay fail to generate enough scares or fears to make the grade as a young adult horror adventure. The takes are much too generic and don’t appear inspired. The technique is better though not the very best and the narrative prefers to short-end the thrills. So in effect it’s much less than what was aimed for.